patrick.net

I never use a debit card OR the visa/debit card feature. A rewards card is the best route to go. Pay it off in full and collect a reward every once in awhile.

#1 reason.
You can phone up a credit card and dispute a charge, any charge, for any stupid reason, and you'll get your money back. The credit card doesn't want to piss you off, it's not skin off their backs, they just do a charge back, visa does a charge back, the other merchant does a charge back, instead of getting some small % of the transaction, they ding the merchant for $20+ (unless it's a 1K+ transaction, they're probably going to do better with the charge back).

Debit cards don't have this same protection, and the money has already come out of your account! Credit cards are unsecured, vs your bank which is tied to real money.

I'm still thinking that many of these credit cards, by killing peoples lines, will often get people to a) either start using their cards again, in fear of losing them (assuming they call and beg to get it re-instated) b) close them up (like most here do), when they weren't really being used anyways. win/win in most cases.

If you're holding a credit card for emergencies, that is probably the *worst* risk a bank can take. If you're in dire needs and starting to max out rarely used cards, chances are you're heading towards a dangerous situation. They want people who will use the card regularly, and make payments regularly, that way they make a steady steam of income from them. If you do go bankrupt, at least they'll have had a good run with you. Unlike the other cards, where you just kept spending and spending until bankruptcy.

"......if our failed economy was not too big to fail then there is no bank that will ever be too big. These ivory towers have to fall before we can rebuild on solid ground." And yet he supported Obamacare. Illogical.

Back to Patrick's original title of this string. Home buyers could not care less what banks or the condition they are in where they are getting their loans from and are too naive to even think about whether they have faith in banks. All they care about are interest rates.

I never had a CC line of credit reduction. I get 2% cash back on all purchases. Debit cards are dangerous.......money comes out of your account when finders find your missing card and use it.

We have a wicked banking system. It is based on multiple indebtedness which is a generator of money supply leading to inflation. Failed small banks get bailed out by the FDIC backed by the gov't with money they don't have. Central banks are backed by the Fed with unlimited power to create money and but their toxic (worthless) assets.

wcalleallegre says

Failed small banks get bailed out by the FDIC backed by the gov’t with money they don’t have.

FDIC is not federal money --it is insurance paid by the banks.

From the good folks at CNN.
JPMorgan Chase said the percentage of its credit card holders who were 30 days behind on a payment was 1.47%, down from 1.75% in the fourth quarter. The company scaled back on the number of reserves for future loan losses in its credit card division by $1 billion, suggesting that troubles within that business could soon start to moderate. Standard & Poor's analyst Matt Albrecht wrote in a note to clients Wednesday that the bank should be able to further reduce provisions for loan losses because of the improved credit trends. Still, JPMorgan's consumer banking and credit card business both ended the quarter in the red, with its persistently troubled card division delivering a loss of $303 million. But when pressed about his outlook for the credit card business, Dimon said that it could very well turn profitable by year end.
No credit card FOR YOU!
Any suggestions on how to play this one? I've had my generous trailing stops (10%) in for a while and am hanging on for the ride. Perhaps I need to tighten them up. Nice to do something right every once in a while...

says

The FDIC ran a deficit last year of $20B. There is an implicit guarantee of Government Support of the FDIC, although they did require banks to prepay 2010 through 2012. Fortunately they found buyers for all the failed banks last year.

That's not unusual--they will run large surpluses during good times and run deficits during bad times.

Not that I want to bring up an aging thread, but yesterday my wife gets a call from Chase that they have important information about my account. She told them correctly that I do not have an account with Chase. The only response was to have me call the number on the back of my credit card. So this morning I just checked online and there is no evidence that they canceled my account as requested. If anyone thought I was overly pissed and taking this too personally before…if I ask you to cancel my card you better do it.

Do not trust this bank…

Also, a distant relative recently past away and someone opened a Chase credit card in their name while they were in critical care in a hospital about two days before they died. Maybe it is not Chase’s fault, but I warned the person dealing with Chase to continue to call them and make sure they canceled the account seems I should have listened to my own advice.

Chase, please explain why my card has not been closed as requested? You have had over a week. Should I call your fraud line and state that Chase has hijacked/stollen my account and will not close it as requested?

BTW, I cut the card up and the last letter you sent, see above, had no contact info. How amd I supposed to contact you?

OK, the Chase web site says my account is open and the phone number I found online gives me a recorded voice saying it is currently closed. Chase needs to get their systems in sync, they had over a week to update the web site with some kind of info the account is closed.

I have closed accounts with banks in the past where the user id and passwords would still work long after, but they always told me that the account was closed or eventually that there was no account associated with the login id.

So, if my account is really close why are contacting me with important new info about my account? There should be no new info or changes for a closed account?