Latest bank fee is for paying off credit card on time every month

[Lucas156]

So all I have to do is not get a credit card in the first place and I wont feel bad at all about the extra fees Im not getting charged.

 

[jedi]

So all I have to do is not get a credit card in the first place and I wont feel bad at all about the extra fees Im not getting charged.

Yes and no. Certain things are hard to do without a credit card. For example if you want to make dinner reservations at Walt Dinsey to have breakfast/lunch/dinner with the characters a CREDIT CARD is required upon reservation. to "hold" your spot. Now you can say just use your debt card with the VISA/MC logo on it. Sure you can do that. But when you use your debt card an the vendor uses it to "confirm" your reservation than that mony is "locked up" (pending) and is no longer in your bank account.

A dinner for 2 adults + 2 kids at the Cinderalla Castle is $150 + tip. You need to make reservations 90 days before you get there to make sure you have a spot. So my $150 will be tied up in my bank account because I use a debt card!

Same applies for hotel reservations, car reservations, etc. The worse part is say you use your debt card for the hotel reservation say 5 nights at Holiday Inn @ 100 a night. So you have just locked up $500 in your account. Now on the 5th day you pay in cash for the hotel. Your $500 locked up do not automatically get released. It cantake up to 7 business days for the release to occur yet it today one day for them to hold your money.

The point is you have to be very careful in terms of cash flow when using your debt card as oppose to a credit card.

 

[rich8483]

i dont get it. just ask for a bail out and everyone will be fine.

 

[rambone]

This is where I'm coming from. I'm not a big-wig corporatist, a CEO, or a greedy banker. I have a job and I pay a lot of taxes. I have outstanding credit and have never carried a balance on my cards. I'm a responsible consumer, out of debt. I have plenty of self-restraint on my purchases. I don't have to cut them up in order to resist spending. For the longest time I have earned cashback-reward-points on all my normal purchases placed on credit cards. I enjoy being able to make online purchases and put them on my credit card. I enjoy having all my monthly purchases consolidated on one statement. I'm happy the way things were.

A couple weeks ago I received a letter from my bank announcing the rescinding of some of the rewards programs and changes in policy. I am reading more and more people posting about negative things happening due to upcoming legislation. More and more articles detailing the "change" we have a-coming.

We are watching a law designed to "help" consumers have the exact opposite effect. This law is not going to help consumers or banks. It is going to hurt both. It is government-intrusion at its best. My ranting about Government intrusion has everything to do with the OP since it is what is causing these changes. There is nothing helpful coming from Congress. They are only hurting things. Is it helping you?

The new law is the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 (H.R. 627) and it was signed by Obama in May. The legislation will take effect in 2010. Banks are taking action now to soften the blow of government intrusion. If they don't make money, they lay off workers and close their door. Profits are a necessary part of business.

Furthermore, this law is affecting all banks the same way. They may take different steps to compensate for the new regulations. But finding one that doesn't have these annoying fees may be difficult now. This is by design. The private sector is under siege.

The net results of this legislation are: more expensive credit, more inaccessible credit, less financial options, more angry customers, more customers leaving banks. Not good for the industry, the economy, consumers, or for me.

Who's happy about the recent changes? As I said before, if this were a good business model then banks would have done it a long time ago. They are doing it now out of desperation, since we've got Comrade Obama taking out the greedy capitalists who loan us money. Life as we know it isn't coming to an end, but I am having to swallow a lot of Socialism lately!

 

[Lucas156]

Yes and no. Certain things are hard to do without a credit card. For example if you want to make dinner reservations at Walt Dinsey to have breakfast/lunch/dinner with the characters a CREDIT CARD is required upon reservation. to "hold" your spot. Now you can say just use your debt card with the VISA/MC logo on it. Sure you can do that. But when you use your debt card an the vendor uses it to "confirm" your reservation than that mony is "locked up" (pending) and is no longer in your bank account.

A dinner for 2 adults + 2 kids at the Cinderalla Castle is $150 + tip. You need to make reservations 90 days before you get there to make sure you have a spot. So my $150 will be tied up in my bank account because I use a debt card!

Same applies for hotel reservations, car reservations, etc. The worse part is say you use your debt card for the hotel reservation say 5 nights at Holiday Inn @ 100 a night. So you have just locked up $500 in your account. Now on the 5th day you pay in cash for the hotel. Your $500 locked up do not automatically get released. It cantake up to 7 business days for the release to occur yet it today one day for them to hold your money.

The point is you have to be very careful in terms of cash flow when using your debt card as oppose to a credit card.

See this is the problem. The problem at this point isn't that you don't have a credit card the problem is that Disney World is penalizing you for not using their preferred method of payment. We need to change this by letting Disney World know. See what Im saying? I don't have any credit cards and amazingly have survived without them for quite a while now.

 

[jedi]

See this is the problem. The problem at this point isn't that you don't have a credit card the problem is that Disney World is penalizing you for not using their preferred method of payment. We need to change this by letting Disney World know. See what Im saying? I don't have any credit cards and amazingly have survived without them for quite a while now.

I understand why they want a credit card. It's logistcially the EASIEST way to deal with the reservation system they have in place. If you fail to show up or fail to cancel 24 hours BEFORE your reservation they charge your CC for it since they lose out on getting someone else in there.

Plus if they had you pay upfront you would be sending payments 90 days before the event which would be a cash flow nightmare for them to deal with. Let alone if you cancelled they would have to send you back a refund as well in the mail. If I was running that type of business it would create a nightmare of tracking the cash. So the CC is the best option in that event. The CC works well for anytype of reservation system to "hold" your stuff.

 

[Jack Ryan]

I understand why they want a credit card. It's logistcially the EASIEST way to deal with the reservation system they have in place. If you fail to show up or fail to cancel 24 hours BEFORE your reservation they charge your CC for it since they lose out on getting someone else in there.

Plus if they had you pay upfront you would be sending payments 90 days before the event which would be a cash flow nightmare for them to deal with. Let alone if you cancelled they would have to send you back a refund as well in the mail. If I was running that type of business it would create a nightmare of tracking the cash. So the CC is the best option in that event. The CC works well for anytype of reservation system to "hold" your stuff.

Disney what ever world and the banks both can KMA. I hope they all starve waiting for any penalty fee from me.

 

[jedi]

Disney what ever world and the banks both can KMA. I hope they all starve waiting for any penalty fee from me.

You miss the point of Disney. Think of any biz in the entertainment type area. If you have a hotel how are you going to secure rooms and ensure you can get your money if your customer fails to show up for their reservation day? Sure you could say "oh well we lose the reservation" but in essence you are losings biz cause that night that you don't rent out that hotel room is money lost.

 

[Jack Ryan]

You miss the point of Disney. Think of any biz in the entertainment type area. If you have a hotel how are you going to secure rooms and ensure you can get your money if your customer fails to show up for their reservation day? Sure you could say "oh well we lose the reservation" but in essence you are losings biz cause that night that you don't rent out that hotel room is money lost.

I didn't miss a thing.

Believe it or not you could get hotel rooms a long time before credit cards existed and I've gotton one heck of a lot more hotel rooms with out a credit card than I ever have with one. You can bet your butt I'll never pay an extra fee to have a credit card or rent a hotel room with or with out a credit card.

I wouldn't spend a penny at Disney anything if they were paying me by the hour to be there. They could start nuking Florida along the state line tomorrow and keep it up until it breaks off and moves over right next to Cuba and you'd never hear a peep of a complaint out of me.

I'll whip saw those belly dragging bankers against each other and the hotel owners too or I'll stay home and they can eat dirt waiting on me.

 

[jedi]

Jack Ryan you bring a smile to me face (I'm not being sarcastic here)! There is in fact someone on this planet that appears to be more "sour" about life then me and I have a very sour look on life 99% of the time. +1 for you.

 

[Jack Ryan]

Jack Ryan you bring a smile to me face (I'm not being sarcastic here)! There is in fact someone on this planet that appears to be more "sour" about life then me and I have a very sour look on life 99% of the time. +1 for you.

Sour don't cause that. Realism, facing facts causes that.

There's three kinds will cover about 95% of the people who smile at a guy in most of his lifetime. One smiles because they are your friend, another smiles because he sees a way to get his hand in your pocket or already has it there and feels something bigger than a nickle, another smiles when they notice you left your fly open and never says a word, and they don't come along in equal proportions either.

By the time yer 54 years old you better have them figured out and be able to recognise 'em pretty quick or you'll wind up broke, embarrassed and friendless.

 

[henktermaat]

Interesting thread. Just another reason to get out of debt, and stay out of debt, folks. Who in their right mind would tolerate such a fee... some folks will, if it's marketed in the right way.

Not me... I cut up my last credit card last month.

 

[henktermaat]

See this is the problem. The problem at this point isn't that you don't have a credit card the problem is that Disney World is penalizing you for not using their preferred method of payment. We need to change this by letting Disney World know. See what Im saying? I don't have any credit cards and amazingly have survived without them for quite a while now.

You don't NEED debt, credit, a FICO score, or credit cards. It's a MYTH propagated by the most successful, most expensive, and most talented marketing effort in the history of the planet.

 

[henktermaat]

Jack Ryan you bring a smile to me face (I'm not being sarcastic here)! There is in fact someone on this planet that appears to be more "sour" about life then me and I have a very sour look on life 99% of the time. +1 for you.

Yes- Jack Ryan is what I'd call a fixture around here

 

[jclark]

No credit cards....haven't had one in years. Sucks for people who have one. Banks are in the business of making money,though.

 

[Prometheus]

It's not sinister. It's the CHANGE that you (all I6BO voters) wanted.

Remember back 2 years ago when george bush was pushing for all the "bankruptcy law changes" and all the bush-bots thought it was a great idea?

Yeah, bush paved the way for obama in every single category, including everything the credit card companies and banks are doing now.

The only difference here is that republicans can SEE it because it's being done by someone with a "d" rather than a "r".

What the government and banks are doing (and have been) is EVIL.

 

[38special]

Proverbs 22:7- The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender.


I'm paying em off and not looking back.

 

[Lucas156]

I think I started a trend in this thread. Reps to many

 

[zky]

I use credit cards responsibly, and have not carried a balance in ~13 years. But what do people do when they go on vacation? I don't like the idea of carrying a bunch of cash, and travellers checks are not that much better. You almost have to have at least one credit card don't you???

Not carrying a credit card would certainly cut down on 'impulse buying', but I enjoy the ability to just pick something up that I see and like without having to plan out having cash on me.

 

[Prometheus]

I use credit cards responsibly, and have not carried a balance in ~13 years. But what do people do when they go on vacation? I don't like the idea of carrying a bunch of cash, and travellers checks are not that much better. You almost have to have at least one credit card don't you???

Not carrying a credit card would certainly cut down on 'impulse buying', but I enjoy the ability to just pick something up that I see and like without having to plan out having cash on me.

Traveling w/o a CC is very difficult. It basically means you cannot stay at a major chain hotel. Renting a car locally is possible if you bring in references and jump thru many hoops.

Forget traveling on your debit card if you plan on staying at more than one hotel, the holds on debit cards can take 8 days to fall off depending on your bank and the hotels processor.

It sucks... but it's doable.

I have 3 credit cards and never carry a balance.

Why three? It appears you can get the max out of your credit lines for each and not influence the others... also and the biggest reason: TRAVELING!

In April I went to Florida w/ the family for just over 2 weeks. We went all over and stayed in different 9 hotels. I only had 2 cards then and by the end of the trip I had maxed one out (I want the reward points and even put my cable bill on the CC) and the other was maxed out with hotel holds... I had to plead with the one CC company to extend my credit limit until all the (obvious) holds came off. It sucked. I came back waited for a decent offer and got the third card.

In any event cash means diddly if you are trying to rent a car or get a decent hotel.

Also being able to drop a few grand on an emergent purchase is a big plus. It just takes discipline to only buy what you can pay off. We bought a new house a couple months ago and I made a decision to carry a partial balance on a card. Cost me 30 bucks for 30 days. I figured it was worth it that one time so I wasn't biting my nails waiting for my paycheck to show up and skimping at the grocery store. I paid it off the next month. I can't see how some people would do that for more than an 'extinuating' circumstance.

I had a friend once say "I wish I could afford to buy a new gun every couple of months..." Aside from him drinking too much starbucks, I told him the interest he pays every three months would buy him a new WASR. He could too... priorities and looking forward rather than looking at the moment.

You CAN do it, it's just not a comfortable and easy... who said being Free was easy though?