I buy everything I can with credit cards, I have one for 3% on groceries, another for 3% on gas a third for 5% on rotating categories and a 4th for 2% on everything with no limits or exclusions. That is not to mention the ones I took to get big rewards for dpending a certain amount. The best one I had was a Marriott rewards card that my wife an I got that gave us two nights in Paris at a Millennium Hotel near the Arch of triumph. $700 to $900 a night. A very nice Hotel in Dublin, and two nights in a Fairfield Inn in Wisconsin.
I even tried to buy my last new car with a credit card but they wouldn’t let me put more than a $2500 deposit on it. I pay no fees or interest and pay them up when due. It saves me a lot of trios to get cash from the bank. I don’t use debit cards because I do not see any advantage to them, unless you don’t have the willpower to not overspend on a credit card.
I buy everything on credit too, and then pay it off at the end of the first month. If nothing else, I automatically get a 100% warranty extension, which has come in handy. It’s also rather nice to be able to tell a business that is trying to screw you that you have no problem initiating a chargeback.
I buy most things on credit too. Then pay credit card off each month. I haven’t had a credit card roll-over in well over 30 years. Save money too. I get 2% back for all gas purchases at ANY gas-station with my USAA AMX card.
I’m curious as to how credit card banks make a profit when they refund more to the card holder than they charge the merchant for purchases. But don’t take that to mean that I am concerned for their well being.
I’ll bet that less then 20% actually pay off their credit card every month. That means the other 80% are paying interest…Credit cards are a HUGE profit margin for banks.
Yeah. They actually dislike those of us who pay the card off on time, but they put up with us in order to get access to people who carry balances for decades.
I had a friend who got a BJs credit card about 10 years ago. He bought a lot of things there including groceries. He paid his bill in full every time it came and at the end of the first year hegot a statment showing his total purchases and total interest and fees. The interest and fees totaled $0.00. The last line on the statement mentioned the lack of interest and fees and told him they could not afford customers like him and they were cancelling his card.
The newest card I took pays 2% back on everything and adds two years to the warranty of almost everything but vehicles. It also has 60 days of price protection on purchasers.
My son has mined so many credit card rewarda offers that he has been declined for a few cards even though his credit score is well above 800.
Like Rod Knox, I also wondered how they can offer more back than the merchant pays. I had a daughter in law that had a really good job selling credit card servicing to merchants for a large bank so I know what the fees are. I think Mike in NH is right but from what I have read, more and more people are paying off their cards in full.
I had a Visa card with Citibank years ago, and because I wasn’t paying interest they wanted to charge me $75/yr to keep the credit card. I cancelled the card the same day.
I found it necessary to accept credit cards at the shop many years ago and my bank furnished all the hardware for less than $40 as I recall and Master Card and Visa hit me for just over 1% of the invoice. Soon after that American Express came through my bank and gave me their “elite” membership card and signage but when the dust settled I was being charged more than 2.5% charge back by them and my card had a $35/year renewal. Needless to say I dropped A-E. American Express cards must be a status symbol for some people.
Personally I don’t think an average credit card debt of $5-10,000 is all that bad. You aren’t going to go bankrupt on that, even at 25% interest. At any rate the only thing I used credit cards for is traveling for hotel, cars, and sometimes gas, plus Nook books I guess. They make money because they charge the business for every transaction. I use debit cards daily though.
The thing is I’m from that lucky generation (or unlucky depending) that the only credit cards there were was for gas or a local department store. There was no Visa. Then all of a sudden there were the general use credit cards and people eventually went nuts. So I went from no cars except a Standard Oil card, to many cards and after paying everything off, I’m not going to use them for daily expenses period. I’ve worked to hard and its a trap.
Do what you will but it still bothers me to have a $150 car rental on a credit card until I pay it off.
I only recall 2 charge backs in many years taking credit cards for AUTO REPAIRS and both were settled in my favor eventually and my only involvement with getting them settled as a few phone conversations as best I can recall.