Got Perfect Credit? You Could Be Charged For It!

[Flamingo]

Credit as we have known it in the past will never be the same. The once open trough of unlimited credit has been cut off for everyone and those that got caught up in using credit beyond their means are now learning that you just can't and won't be able to live beyond your means anymore. Change is hard. Credit card companies are a business like any other business. They are out to make money to survive, pay their employees and stockholders. All companies impose fees and cut costs or raise fees to customers in order to do so. Everything has gone up...health insurance premiums have doubled for many, tolls on many roads have doubled, property and other taxes increase, food and drug costs continue to rise...so you can bet the credit card issuers will look to those paying off their balances each month to fund some of the losses incurred and those losses include all the bankruptcies filed by those who went crazy with all the free credit and lived beyond their means. Someone has to pay for losses in any business.

[banca rotta]

Credit cards get paid from the use of the card via the merchants who take the card.

Now if you have a card and never use it then there's no point in keeping them as a customer. But CC always make money on people who use it, via transaction fees or interest charges via carrying a balance

Not sure how true this is. I know Visa and MC as well as Amex get paid from merchants but the banks do not.

The banks are "kind enough" to loan us money because they are hoping that we are trapped for a long time before we either pay it off or discharge it in a bk.

Now that most people are living with cash and debit cards () they are looking for new ways to fleece us but it won't fly for most. Some uneducated consumers will pay this fee but most will cut the cards.

I think this is the beginning of the end for this credit card business. Wishful thinking anyway.

[banca rotta]

This makes perfect sense to me. They are a business. They are lending you $ for purchases, for your convenience. Why does it make sense that you shouldn't ever have to pay anything for that service? That the fees should ONLY be paid by the people who carry balances? Because everyone gets the benefit of the ease of using the credit card instead of cash, gets to "float" that money for the several weeks before the charge comes due, so even if they pay it off 100% when the bill comes in, there must still be some advantage to using the credit card or else why wouldn't you just pay cash? They get the added consumer protections, limit their liability for losses (lose $ and you are screwed, lose a credit card, only liable for $50 of fraudulent use, if no one uses it, haven't lost a thing!) etc. I guess I just don't "get" why banks should carry all of the costs and risks of extending credit to people they make no profit from, in fact are losses for them because of the paperwork involved. Used to be ALL credit cards had fees, you paid for the privileged of carrying one. It's only been in the past 20 years or so people feel that credit cards should only charge fees to those that carry over balances from month to month.

Well said. Like them or not they are a business. I "float" my balances to use their free money but I have the savings to back my purchases. I just want the benefits of the card. If they charge me a fee then the card is gone!

The only thing with them being a "business" is a "business" shouldn't ask the tax payers for bailouts.

[sisterfunkhaus]

There are many people who use the services of the credit card companies and collect rewards, but the banks never make a dime off of them. I am all for charging these people, as the banks are businesses. They shouldn't have to lose money on rewards points customers who pay their bills and never pay anything in interest. I have no sympathy for those who play the system getting something for nothing. That costs other users money, after all someone has to be paying for these airline miles and cashback rewards these "ultra responsible" people are getting.

The bailouts are a different stories. The government giving bailouts doesn't entitle people to get everything free. They have to eventually pay the money back too from what I understand. I honestly wish bail outs would have never have happened, but that is another conversation.