One of AT&T Universal Card account holders pages has a little ad: "'I'm finished with high-rate balances.' Consolidate you high-rate credit cards into one monthly payment and save money on interest."
My rate is now 20.030% APY. Gosh, what kind of "high-rates" are they talking of?
I wonder if I'm better off taking money out of a mutual fund to pay this high-rate balance and paying myself instead. But then I'll have to figure out the capital gains and report it on next year's taxes. And the price per share could go up getting me fewer shares when I put the money back. Or the reverse. Decisions, decisions!
Showing posts with label interest rates. Show all posts
Showing posts with label interest rates. Show all posts
Sunday, October 09, 2011
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Fight big banks! Use cash!
Banks claim they need to increase the swipe fee on debit cards to maintain their profits. Currently many merchants pay a minimum of about 25 cents each time a customer used a debit card. Many banks want to raise this to over 40 cents.
I talked to one merchant recently, and he said that he also gets charged two percent of each debit card sale. Gosh, what a sweet deal for the banks. In two days time, they have taken the money out of the customer's account and put the money in the merchant's account; all done electronically without human intervention.
If they are charging two percent on other people's money for two days, that means they are earning about 180 percent per year! And they begrudge paying their own customers one percent on savings!
I still use my debit card and credit card for online transactions, but as often as I can I pay cash for bricks and mortar purchases. It means that I have to visit my bank or one of its ATMs more frequently, but I am helping the local economy my keeping more money in the local merchant's pockets. Maybe one of these days I may return to writing checks for purchase larger than the cash I want to carry.
I talked to one merchant recently, and he said that he also gets charged two percent of each debit card sale. Gosh, what a sweet deal for the banks. In two days time, they have taken the money out of the customer's account and put the money in the merchant's account; all done electronically without human intervention.
If they are charging two percent on other people's money for two days, that means they are earning about 180 percent per year! And they begrudge paying their own customers one percent on savings!
I still use my debit card and credit card for online transactions, but as often as I can I pay cash for bricks and mortar purchases. It means that I have to visit my bank or one of its ATMs more frequently, but I am helping the local economy my keeping more money in the local merchant's pockets. Maybe one of these days I may return to writing checks for purchase larger than the cash I want to carry.
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