Paying Credit Card in full or not

By forgetting to pay in time. By forgetting to transfer enough funds to my current account to pay off the full amount. By paying before the due date but the bank transfer delays+holidays take it past the due date. By accidentally paying the wrong card. By being away from home and not seeing the statement, or not being able to pay it from abroad, or any number of difficulties (I used to be away 4-6 months of the year and we are talking some years ago when international options were limited).

Or, as explained in other posts, not fully understanding how to avoid paying unnecessary interest on cash advances. Not understanding that if I pay 75% on time and 25% of the amount a couple of days late, I pay interest on 100% of the amount. Plus several other underhand methods of getting extra money out of me, which I can't recall at the minute.

That's unknown territory for me. I avoid large direct debits and keep a reasonable balance so that hasn't happened yet.

And Maestro? (In fact the first *6* letters are the same!). Is it really a coincidence they are so similar?

(And the same colour. As stowed in my wallet, only the top strip was visible and this was identical across cards. Recent cards are more distinctive)

I must have done.

Well, they can make sure they are distinctive. Needing a magnifying glass to tell them apart is not reasonable. This is not a big deal but it's just an extra episode showing how possessing a credit card can cost money even when I didn't intend to use it.

So put it into a bank account to pay the credit card off when the bill arrives then.

At 19:34:57 on 13/04/2009, BartC delighted uk.finance by announcing:

Maestro is a MasterCard brand. It's out of the bank's control. And I really don't understand your point about the first 6 letters either. They're in a different order, and MasterCard is a longer word. It's not too difficult to tell the difference. Besides, many ATMs now warn you if you're about to take cash out on a credit card.

And unnecessary. The MasterCard brand logos are similar in that they have a pair of overlapping circles. Other than that, they're different colours and have different words. Your main beef seems to be with the bank wanting to have a strong brand identity.

Down to your inattention; nothing to do with the bank.

At 21:35:04 on 13/04/2009, Simon Finnigan delighted uk.finance by announcing:

Zactly. My gf actually has a system where she treats everything spent on her CC as having already come out of her bank. This can lead to her 'running out' of money whilst having hundreds of pounds still in her account.

Pretty much what I do. I get all the extras that using a credit card offers, while not running the risk of overspending.

The latter is one of the worst things you can do, as you will be charged interest on the full balance from the date of transaction, not just on the remaining £10. Assuming you have the extra £10, you should pay it off completely.

Some debit cards offer the same protection as a credit card. Nationwide's VISA debit card does, for example.

robert

And their regular credit card has other wonderful benefits too.

But when I tried to sign-up online for it, after several minutes spent giving them all my private personal details, I get a screen saying: "Your application has been refused". Thanks, I needed a slap in the face like that.

At 12:05:57 on 15/04/2009, RobertL delighted uk.finance by announcing:

Similar, not the same. VISA debit cards are covered by the VISA Debit Chargeback scheme, but it's not legally binding.

Can you point us towards an official source of this information? I can't find anything on the nationwide web site.

With the best will in the world, I`d much rather rely on a pice of law to give me protection than a vague promise from a bank - using credit gives you legal protection, using a debit card leaves you at the mercy of your banks policies on chargebacks.

That's not what Nationwide once told me.

They were emphatic that a credit card gives better protection in a card not present transaction and should be used for such, not their debit card.

You would be charged interest on £1000 for however long the credit card company considers it outstanding (likely to be more than 1 day as payments are not credited immediately), and then on £100.

Next time, get a Maestro debit and a Visa credit card, or a Visa debit and a Mastercard credit. Or even better, get a chip&signature credit card, so that you (or anyone else) won't be able to withdraw cash from a machine

At 21:33:40 on 15/04/2009, s snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com delighted uk.finance by announcing:

Erm, that ain't how it works. Chip&Sig cards still allow online PIN verification.

Yes, but if you destroy the PIN when you get it and don`t read it, you`re then unable to use the card in a cash machine.

Bitstring , from the wonderful person Simon Finnigan said

My (three different) C&Sig cards were not even issued with PINs. This sort of guarantees you can't use them in an ATM.

I think mine came with a PIN, but it`s a long time ago so I couldn`t swear to it either way.