Penny Pinching Mom

Who Can You Trust With Your Credit Card Number?

I’ve been using credit and debit cards for some time now. I got my first credit card when I was 18. I was quite responsible with it, and ended up with two more by the time I was in my early 20s. But then I started getting carried away with them, and then I lost my job, and things just went downhill from there.

Today, I only have two debit cards in my name. After I told Hubby my story, he wasn’t interested in getting any credit cards for himself. But last year I talked him into getting one for emergencies. Now we owe more on it than we should due to the past year or so being a pretty much constant emergency, but we’ve always made the payment on time so far and are paying extra on it as much as possible.

Having a credit card can be good for other reasons, too. One of the most compelling advantages it has over a debit card is fraud protection. If your credit card or credit card number is stolen or misused, you can’t legally be held liable for more than $50 in charges. With debit cards, that number is much higher. And with a credit card, if you buy something that is defective or doesn’t do what the manufacturer claims, you can go through the credit card company to get your money back if necessary.

Still, I’m a little leery of using a debit or credit card in some instances. I’ve heard the horror stories of people who’ve ordered things like weight loss supplements and books on a subscription-type plan where you were supposed to be able to cancel at any time. Sometimes the companies would charge their cards even after they canceled, and they had trouble getting their money back. That’s not to say that all such companies are unscrupulous. I know they’re not, because I ordered such a trial on diet pills many years ago and didn’t have any problems canceling. But it’s hard to trust companies that you know little or nothing about because of the few that do rip people off.

I would imagine that it would be easier to get a refund through a credit card company than the bank through which you have your debit card. I’ve never had that experience myself, though. I’ve considered ordering a book club membership for Pumpkin that only costs $5 for the first month and you can cancel at any time, but we can’t afford to be ripped off right now, so I keep putting it off. Am I being overly paranoid?