Advanta Corp is a company that offers small businesses credit cards in the United States. Yesterday the lender filed for bankruptcy protection. The company, in its filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Deleware District, listed assets of $363 million and debts totaling $331 million.

The company came into hardships after many of its small business clients simply could no longer afford to pay the balance or the minimum payment on credit cards lent by the company because they had also come under economic hardships. According to the company, it is trying to collect $2.7 billion from the accounts of 360,000 customers. The accounts are closed to new charges, but the outstanding balance is killing the company.

It had decided to shut down its credit card lending business five months ago to try to keep something like this, or worse, a takeover of its bank by the FDIC, from happening. however, it appears as though the bank will likely be taken over by the FDIC shortly because its level of capital is below regulatory requirements.

The company said that it has almost $100 million in cash and cash equivalents available, but would not be capable of meeting all of the debt obligations that will become due. There are around $138 million of senior retail investment notes still outstanding. The company’s largest unsecured debt holder is the Bank of New York Melton; it is investing in $230 million in debt for the lender.

Due to the announcement, of course, the stock for the publicly traded company fell 70%. It fell from 25 cents to 8 cents after hitting its all time low of just seven and a half cents.

Not included in the bankruptcy filing is Advanta Bank Corp. Also, customers who are making payments to their credit cards need to continue making payments on time because this has no effect on those accounts.

GM really wants to draw in customers. They didn’t do as well through the cash for clunkers program as their competitors did and now it looks like the company is actually doing something about sluggish sales to help draw in customers that are wary of the company.

GM will begin offering a money back guarantee on all their cars. The terms are that anytime up to 60 days after you purchase your new car, you can bring it back in for a full refund.

The program is called “May the Best Car Win.”

So, you can expect a barrage of advertisements no doubt about people who have been wary of the company in the past and since it filed for bankruptcy protection. GM already has one that is going to start going into rotation with the new GM Chairman Edward Whitacre Jr. where he tells viewers about his doubts in the company and how his opinion has changed over the summer.

The program is only set to run through November 30th.

Of course, there are a few stipulations to the refund. First, the purchasers have to be current on all the payments on the vehicle and secondly, the car can’t have more than 4,000 miles on it. It also only applies to the four brands that are still standing after the bankruptcy filing: GMC, Chevrolet, Buick and Cadillac. It also only applies to new cars.

GM has a lot of work to do to catch up with Toyota and Honda. I believe that the company offering a money back refund is probably one of the better things it can do. The only problem I can see coming about from the program is that many of the people who go to return the car for the refund will find themselves being pressured to keep the car. I, like I have said in the past, am not a huge fan of high pressure sales tactics and this is something that would likely keep me away from GM.

I do applaud GM for trying though. At least the company is attempting to do something besides offer more money off the price of a car. I like that they recognize and are attempting to do something about the fact that many potential customers still view their cars as unreliable and cheap.