How Credit Card Use Costs Everyone

Welcome to Tip’d, a social media site for finance, investing, and business topics. Want to participate? » Join Tip’d now! or read our FAQ.

Tip It

How Credit Card Use Costs Everyone

Posted by CreditCardsCanada 449 days ago, popular 448 days ago (http://www.creditcardscanada.ca)
Category: Personal Finance | Tags: credit credit cards money

When most of us think of the cost of using credit cards, we think of annual fees, interest charges and over the limit costs. Few of us think about the costs that everyone pays when it comes to using credit cards.

3 Comments addto

Save & Share Topple

Spam? Topple this!

Comments Who Tip'd

Comments

auburnfan23 448 days ago

If you are responsible and pay your bill monthly and get great points back from the CC Companies I see no problem with anyone using a cc..

[Moderator's note: Link removed. Please do not add links that do not add value to the story.]

furball4 448 days ago

If merchants can't be bothered to gang up on the Visa/MC/Amex cartel and demand dramatic fee reductions, AND they can't be bothered to collaborate on their own card issuers/infrastructures, then I can't be bothered to worry about their expense structure.

I, the consumer, am the one party to the transaction who CAN'T affect the rates paid to card issuers by merchants. But if Walmart, Home Depot, Sears, Safeway, etc. got together and told the issuers, "make your merchant-facing fees match debit cards - pass the rest on to the consumer if you must - or else we'll create a consortium and replace you with our own issuer", they would either play ball or get bypassed. There is nothing stopping the major merchants from doing this. They have the customers and they control the PoS infrastructure. The banks whose names get slapped on the cards are just mercenaries in this equation - they'll issue cards for whomever pays them to, and will follow customer demand. Visa/MC/Amex would be out on a limb if merchants chose to put them there.

JoeTaxpayer 447 days ago

furball - well said. The cost is there, but a few of us simply not using cards will mean we absorb cost but ignore the rewards.

Want to leave a comment on this story? Login or join Tip'd to comment.

A community for financial news, ideas, and tips