On 04-Mar-12 13:18, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 17:28:38 on Sun, 4
Mar 2012, Graham Nye remarked:
As a result, there's an aura of literally "poor man's card" hanging over
all debit cards.

Eh? This might be true for Solo/Electron cards (which never seemed to
be accepted by everyone), though I don't have any experience with one.
I do have a couple of debit cards, replacing cheque guarantee and ATM
cards on my current accounts (US:checking accounts)[1], but I've never
noticed any form of poor man's aura about them.

[1] As do tens of millions of other UK current account holders.

ATM cards are OK, but I'm sure Debit cards have a flavour of "I'm not
creditworthy enough to have a Credit Card".

At least in the US, pure ATM cards are getting rare; most have been
replaced by debit cards, which are usable in ATMs. And debit cards are
typically included with checking accounts, so nearly everyone has one.

Many people who previously used credit/charge cards for convenience (and
paid in full every month) now use their debit cards instead.

A lot of credit card holders use them in effect as charge cards, as a
substitute for the "monthly credit" that the middle classes used to get
from tradesmen.

Before my time but, given the interest rates on credit cards, how else
would you use them if you are in a position to clear the debt on them
each month?

It's a cashflow issue. My main reason for using credit cards is because
I'm paying for travelling expenses that will get billed to a client.

A business charge card (which is how you _use_ yours, even if that's not
how the bank sees it) is an entirely different matter from a personal
(revolving) credit card.

S

--
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CCIE #3723 "God is an inveterate gambler, and He throws the
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