I have both a credit card and a debit card. Debit card for day to day purchases in place of a cheque or cash, credit card for purchases where I need protection. If I buy by mail order, or items over �100 or book a holiday, I use my credit card because if the goods don't arrive, if there's a problem with the item over �100, if the holiday company goes bust, I get my money back on a credit card, but not on a debit card.
There is another sort of card like American Express, which is a charge card where the whole balance has to be paid off at the end of the month (at least that was always the case). My credit card has no annual fee (they did try it for a while, but people left in droves). Some businesses have a statement on their receipts which say that there is a handling charge of x% for payment with a debit or credit card, but that every customer pays the same regardless of the method they use ie they absorb the handling charge just to get your custom (or rather they spread it out over all customers). Rarely can you get a discount for cash - most of the commission made by a sales person is on the credit agreement or extended warranty if they can persuade you to go that route, so they'd rather you used their finance company than your credit card. We were quite pressured to have finance on our new car instead of paying cash, with statements like "the interest you pay on the loan will be less than the interest you lose by drawing the money out of your savings account." The salesman lost the commission he would have got because we paid cash. I diagree with Joy - a credit card is a way to borrow moneyif you want. You can buy something you can't afford and spread the payments over several months. And you are charged interest. I quote from the back of my last credit card statement: "Monthly rate: If you are charged interest, your monthly purchase, cash and promotional rates are displayed after any tramsactions in the 'Detailed information' section of your statement. Interest: Interest will be charged from the date of the transaction if you do not pay the full balance by the payment due date. Interest is charged on a daily basis until the full balance is paid. If you don't pay off the full statement balance by the payment due date, you'll pay less interest the earlier you make a payment. Estimated interest: This is an estimate of next month's interest, based on the minimum payment reaching us on the payment due date. It is for guidance only and could vary, depending on a number of factors including when your payment reaches us, the amount that you repay, if you use your card before your next statement date and if there is a change to your interest rate (please refer to your terms and conditions for details of these changes.)" Barclaycard obviously thinks they charge interest. To distinguish the different checks, English English spells the piece of paper you write on to make a payment and that piece of paper filled in and signed authorising payment a 'cheque'. 'Check' is used for all other purposes like verifying something, a squared pattern, to stop, check in at a hotel or airport, check up, check off (to put a tick against something). Jean in Poole To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace-chat [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
