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Using your debit card more than credit card these days?

6:14 am October 7, 2009, by Henry Unger

The recession is cooling our appetite for living on credit.

After years of saying “Charge it,” consumers are more often paying with their debit cards instead, the Washington Post reports.

Worry about jobs, fear of fluctuating interest rates on credit cards and wariness about spending too much are contributing to the change, the Post says.

“People are managing their money in a different way,” David Robertson, publisher of the Nilson Report, which tracks the credit card industry, told the Post. “You clearly have a situation where those people who have jobs are exhibiting recession anxiety and they are making more debit transactions.”

Is this true for you? Are you pulling out your debit card first?

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15 comments Add your comment

Barbara

October 7th, 2009
7:19 am

I just use a Prepaid Debit Card now, I use it because the bank will charged all those fees for a 1.00 overpayment and they are making so much money off of the consumers. I can’t spend what I don’t have and the banks don’t care about how they trust the customers its our money not theirs.

mitzymy

October 7th, 2009
7:34 am

I use my debit card for everything I buy. It is so easy, and I don’t have to carry cash, which I lose, one way or another. This way I can keep up with what I am spending my money on. When I get my statement, I check to see if there are any false charges, and I did find one at CVS. It seems the clerk could not get the register to respond, and hit the button twice, charging me twice. When I printed off my statement from the computer and took it back to the store they then removed one of the charges. I also keep my reciepts until the charge is posted on my account on the banks web page, and I then check it off in my checkbook register. I use up to $900.00 per month on my debit card, which was a surprise to me the first time I noticed it, but it let me know where the money was going. I do not pay bills with my debit card, just grocery shopping, clothes shopping, gas, and incidentals at various stores, which are small. My bank does not allow me to go over what I have on hand in the account, which is what I requested.

clyde

October 7th, 2009
7:36 am

We never carry a balance on our credit card.We use it occasionally just to let the company know we’re alive.We use debit to purchase groceries and pay the lights and phone.For all other purchases we use cash.We pay the computer bill via direct deposit.

We never were big spenders and we never will be.

Jennifer

October 7th, 2009
7:48 am

I switched to using my debit card more about 18 months ago. I joined my banks “change to saving” program and that helps squirrel away rainy day or special project money. It also helped pay off the credit cards.

LT

October 7th, 2009
8:13 am

I use cash more these days, but not my debit card so much. When I heard the amount of grief you might face from a bank if your identity gets stolen, I stopped using my debit card as much. I’m not gonna be out thousands of dollars b/c the bank considers me a risk if someone steals my identity {ID theft has happened to me before, unfortunately}. I do hate to put things on my CCs these days, esp considering that they are all about to raise their APRs.

Brian

October 7th, 2009
8:24 am

Debit cards are still dangerous. They don’t offer the same protections as credit cards.

Road Scholar

October 7th, 2009
10:35 am

While I use my credit cards for big purchases, I usually do not carry a balance. I use cash or my debit card since my bank pays me 4% interest on my checking account if I use my debit card at least 12 times a month and do an automatic bill pay!

neal kelley

October 12th, 2009
1:48 pm

I use a prepaid debit card also. I hate bank of Am*rica. They charge you a 35 dollar over draft fee when you are 50 cent over. That is crazy. So i now have my money go into a federally insured prepaid visa card. Free transactions.. and no more NSF fees…

Dan Winters

October 18th, 2009
6:55 pm

What banks give a very good interest rate if you use their DEBIT CARD 10-12 times a month?
I read 4% above. Is there a web site that follows the interest rates and perhaps min and max deposit requirements?

Also, some banks can and do give the same theft protection to debit and credit cards – just check first.

thanks, dan at dancwinters@yahoo.com

Julie

October 20th, 2009
6:57 pm

I just use cash its easier for me to stay on my budget. I don’t have any credit cards and have no interest in ever having them in my life.

Starring Peter Graves as Capt. Over

October 20th, 2009
8:18 pm

Cut up the credit cards several months ago. Only use debit card. Working on paying off credit cards. If I can’t pay cash (or use a debit card) for something, I do without.

Baer Thompson

October 21st, 2009
10:16 am

I have always used credit cards and will continue to do so. I also pay my balance in full at the end of the month. Debit cards make me uncomfortable because if someone unauthorized gains access they can drain my bank account. Even though I’d probably get all the money back, except $50, I’d be without funds until the situation was resolved and I really wonder how interested the bank would be in resolving the issue quickly.

Rich

October 21st, 2009
11:30 am

Check with your bank, but in most cases if you sign for your debit card purchases (as opposed to entering your PIN), you get the same protection from Visa/MasterCard as traditional credit card users receive. I was double-billed on my Chase debit MasterCard, called Chase and the charge was reversed in less than eight hours. I only enter my PIN when I need to get cash back. Prepaid debit cards are a good idea, too. Most of them offer direct deposit and some of them (Wal-Mart, for example) have no transaction fees and a low monthly maintenance fee ($3). As with other debit cards, you get Visa protection when you sign for your purchases.

Perkle

October 21st, 2009
12:48 pm

I have always used my debit card. Have only had one problem in 11 years of using it and the bank fixed it within a couple of days. Do not use credit cards, its either cash or debit card.

ALLBANKSARECROOKS

October 21st, 2009
1:11 pm

I mostly used my debit card until I discovered that banks hold transactions longer than they should in order to collect NSF fees when they finally decide to push the debits through once they see your account is under a certain amount….like if I use my debit card for gas on Monday the charge won’t come out of my account until the following Monday if my funds are getting low at the time…it’s not fair and it’s not right. I know how the banking system works because I work in IT with transactional systems like the ones at all the major banks…believe me…IT DOES NOT TAKE THAT LONG FOR A BANK TO PROCESS A CHECK OR ANY TRANSACTION FOR THAT MATTER MOST DAY TO DAY TRANSACTIONS CAN BE FULLY PROCESSED WITHIN 24 hours of the transaction time..THEIR POLICIES ARE DESIGNED TO STEAL OUR MONEY….and that’s why BofA had to settle for these same type practices earlier this year….greedy b@stards….

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