How to sue my credit card company ?

We are certain the merits of our case itself are strong in our favor and are well documentd (the case involves errors on their part in stop payment on "credit card" checks that eventually went through). We just came out of small claims today- the case was squashed -- on service and jurisdiction/venue. We have the right entity and served them correctly. Problem is these credit card corps are very unavailable to sue- at least in small claims (in California)- They do tons of business in Cali. but have NO registered agent- there4 we had to serve their summons to them in Delaware, which means we can't sue them in California because they were served out of state. The Judge told us to file a Limited Civil claim but as it turns out the SAME is true despite the long arm statute of Cali. We have limited time due to SOL. We are about to go down to federal court and file a complaint (@ $350/filing). What court do we sue in (without going to Delaware)? I'm not a Lawyer! HELP

The suit will likely be governed by the laws of Delaware because of your credit card agreement's choice of law section. You'll need a lawyer to help you draft a civil complaint. You absolutely CAN sue them in California, even if they have no agent in the state. If the company does extensive business in California then they are almost certainly subject to the jurisdiction of California courts, but you will need to comply with California's rules regarding out-of-state service.

As for your federal complaint, your action may or may not be governed by federal law, depending on how the courts interpret the credit card company's "checks." If the court decides that the checks are actually checks, and not credit card instruments, then you're wasting your time filing in federal court - you don't meet the requirements. I think your best bet is to hire a California lawyer familiar with interstate litigation, and he will almost certainly sue in California state court, applying Delaware's version of the Uniform Commercial Code as per your agreement, which is fortunately almost exactly the same as California's. Good luck.

What you need to do is...GET a LAWYER
who is licensed to practise both in CA and DE.
Good luck. sounds like you're throwing good money after bad--but maybe you'll find an attorney who will do a class action lawsuit on your behalf. Do a search for "class action" and "attorney" and "licensed to practice" and "DE" and "CA"