Mr. Nguyen Hoang Hai said that besides the known advantages of being convenient for spending now and paying later, credit cards also have risks. Having worked at a bank for ten years, he still does not use this card.
Credit cards, besides the advantages, also have disadvantages that we rarely expect.
Banks often inform about this type of card: “It’s a card you spend first and pay later. Without money, you can still buy goods, pay for your children’s tuition, or spend money when you need it urgently, you can even withdraw it.” cash out to use”.
Usually we will pay monthly on a fixed date. If you pay on time or before due date, no interest will be charged. That way, users will be very profitable!
But the problem is not so simple. Borrowers are often people with less stable income who have to overspend on loan money. And life is more difficult than we think. When you don’t pay your debt on time, it can be for many reasons: You go on a business trip, you forget, the company’s salary is paid later than planned… At that time, you will be listed in the “Overdue debt” group.
Good math problems start here. Credit card overdue interest rates are not cheap, can be up to several tens of percent a year. If you are overdue for many months or years, this will be a not small amount of money, possibly up to tens or hundreds of millions of dong.
Illustration of a credit card (Photo: IT).
More dangerously, spending money that you don’t have (borrowing to spend first) will form habits of not knowing how to manage personal finances.
With the appeal of today’s online sales livestream technology or special advertisements on social networking platforms, we see shopping demand suddenly skyrocket. What we want is often much greater than what we have.
And if you become a shopaholic and can’t control your spending, the habit of saving will disappear and instead become the habit of consuming, not buying something is unbearable.
Many people have become “Lord Chom” like that. Anyone, a housewife or a bank employee, or a parking attendant with unstable income can get caught up in this.
Second is the fear of being hacked (cyberattack) or having card information stolen or losing the card. When you have all kinds of cards in your wallet, sometimes you don’t even remember where that card was lost or forgotten. I often withdraw money from ATMs and have forgotten my card at ATMs no less than 10 times.
If you forget or lose your credit card, it could be a disaster. If an ATM card has a PIN code, it is difficult to be hacked if it is lost because it is not easy to guess the password.
But credit cards are different, anyone can swipe them. Online shoppers also easily leave card information on platforms. If these platforms are attacked by hackers, millions of card information could be stolen.
Many hackers specialize in using credit cards with stolen information, to the point that Facebook sometimes does not accept payments if the cardholder is from Vietnam or charges too high advertising fees. There are also many cases caused by using “temple cards” or even running or “exploding” cards.
In short, the risk of putting yourself in the position of a senior debtor and the risk of having your card information stolen are the two main reasons why I, a person who has worked in banking for decades, does not have a credit card in my life. wallet.
I accept being a low-tech person!
* The article represents the author’s perspective