Using your credit card for the points? Don't make payments too soon!
 

Six months ago I decided to try to accrue credit card points and then made payments within days. However, I have been charged $22 in interest while earning $14.50 in points. Losing $7.50 isn't a huge deal, but it shouldn't have happened, I should have earned $14.50.

Each month I am confused that I have any purchase balance at all and that I am charged interest on it. I called Navy Federal and the lady did not have any idea why I was being charged interest, so she suggested that I talked to her supervisor. The supervisor gave me a long and complicated explanation. I asked "I am making payments too soon?"

"Sir, I did not say that!" She then gave me a longer and more complicated explanation. I asked what my current purchase balance is (which I can only ever see on my statements) and she said $436.95!

My balance is $215 lower than it was six months ago, but I have over $400 in recent purchases?

I said "I will make an immediate payment of $436.95 and then stop using your card because I am making payments too soon. Have a good night."

With altogether too much enthusiasm she responded "You too!"

The problem is that I made payments on pending charges, so $222 went towards my balance transfer, and the rest went for recent purchases. Somehow I do not have 30 days to pay off purchases before paying interest because I have a balance transfer.

They are not required to have a grace period?

https://ecomodder.com/forum/attachme...1&d=1583478679

Your title is click bait because you leave out the important detail until the end of your story; that you had a balance transfer. Then you've omitted the terms of the balance transfer (is it interest free for a period of time, what are the rules for paying it off, etc).

So you've missed some fine print that said something about how payments in excess of statement billing pay down the balance transfer, and it sounds like that caused you to carry a statement balance beyond the grace period.

All of that would be avoided if you'd do your banking online (do it between Youtube videos) and set automatic payments up, and observe the current charges (you don't need a paper statement to see those).

I know it's frustrating, but you've learned something here. Consider that a cheap lesson.

Balance transfers incur instant interest.
Usually less than 5%.
I only did it once, about 14 years ago, only took once for me to learn, I didn't read all the fine print.

I asked her what my purchase balance was because it is not listed except on my statement.

Navy Federal does not charge transfer fees.

You're telling me that if you log into Navy Federal and click on your credit card account, there is no place that lists line by line the charges to your card?

Every online portal I've used in the past 15 years has included the option to "show recent transactions" or some such thing.

...and the grace period is not from the date of purchase, but from the statement date. That means if you purchase something on the 1st, and the statement comes on the 31st, you get those days for free, plus the grace period to pay the statement balance.

I just signed up for a card with a 2.5% cashback on all purchases. It has a $100 annual fee, but it's 1% higher interest than anything else I could find. The first $10k spent on the card makes the fee back, and anything thereafter is extra money. I pay nearly everything on my card, so exceeding $10k will be easy, though I do have an Amazon card that gives 5% back on all purchases on Amazon.

Key take away is if you want zero percent interest revolving balance transfer debt you neEd the card to be ONLY for that purpose and a completely separate card for daily transactions

It does not show my purchase balance.

I have found credit union card services have been pretty lacking. Even as of 2011 credit Langley fcu had basic see your balance and that's about it on line access.
All the big consumer card companies had real time itemized card access for around 10 years at that point.

My HealthEquity HSA account with $1,000 balance has a monthly $4 fee. I was outraged, so I transferred all the funds to my other HSA and incurred a $25 account closure fee. Vipers, all of those bankers.

Anyhow, I found out my company is paying the "maintenance" fee, so I'm moving funds back so I can put them in an index fund instead of getting 0.0000001% interest in savings.

I stopped using credit cards in the 1970s because it reminded me of my [first ;)] ex-wife. Now I'm reluctant to handle cash with my bare hands because reasons.

I've determined I'll need to get a smart phone, and fortunately the $150 Pinephone is shipping. It runs any flavor of Linux rather than iPhone or Android OS. I know it's easy in some countries to do contactless payment via QR code. Is that possible in the USofA?

Contactless payments via NFC (does that use the same radio as bluetooth?). Never heard of QR payments.

I hope to see an official US digital distributed-ledger currency in my lifetime.

I probably have a Pixel XL for ya if you wanted to play with Android. You do realize it's easy to create accounts with any name you'd like to provide.

Why are you making payments a couple days later? That sounds way too complicated.

I do the same thing as Redpoint. I use the card and have the the payment set for autopay from my checking account. Once a week I go into Mint and check my transactions to see if anything looks funny.

While rewards are nice the real money to be made is in the sign up bonus. We generally do 2-3 new cards a year for the bonus. The current card is a United Visa that gives 60,000 miles if you spend $3,000 in 3 months. That is roughly $1,000 in airline tickets. We don't bother with a card unless it pays at least $500 in a signing bonus. We cancel the card after the signing bonus pays out.

We also each have a Chase card that we keep to establish a long credit history for our credit ratings. Those each have a small charge per month to keep them active and again, that bill is on autopay.

Managing credit is important in the USA. Lots of things seemingly unrelated are priced differently based on credit rating. (Like insurance rates)

Luckily the rules for managing credit are pretty easy.
1. Pay your bills on time - every time (35% of score)
2. Keep your credit card balance low (Don't use more than about 30% of your available credit) (30% of score)
3. Establish a long credit history. (Keep at least one card basically forever) (15% of score)
4. Use different types of credit. Credit cards, auto loans, mortgage. (10% of score)
5. Keep your credit inquiries low (don't let people run your credit unless they need to) (10% of score)

#4 is the only thing that could cost someone money if they took a loan they didn't need to boost their score. Luckily it is only 10% of the total score so someone can have excellent credit without it. (740 or better)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_code_payment
I'm being dragged, kicking and screaming: wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_(operating_system)#Scope_of_surveillance_b y_public_institutions

I didn't read it, but the really paranoid can use a proxy, turn of location sharing, and who cares if they know where Donald Duck is currently located anyhow?

Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on how you look at it), your demise will probably be of the regular sort; cancer or heart disease...

...and personally, as I've mentioned before, I'd prefer trouble to come find me if trouble needs to encounter stubborn opposition. I won't let trouble push me into the shadows for safety, because that's where it should live.

I have three months left of 0% APR, but they are still offering the same terms for new transfers, so I could use another card, and just transfer the balance.

Will they have different lines for the balances with different expiration dates? :)

When I pay my taxes I will put the rest of my school pay towards the credit card. I will have about two months of pay to put towards it, but then I will just have the one job for three months.

I plan on using a savings account that pays more than 0.25% next school year. Currently the account that pays the best without crazy requirements is 1.9%. I figure that I would earn about $140 in interest on that.

My high interest checking account has a requirement for 12 debit transactions per month and direct deposit. Not too crazy. I load my Amazon account with 12 $0.50 transactions on the card to meet the requirement. Just did that today in fact.

Thank you for your support.

Hey, if it's looking like the irregular sort of demise, I'm willing to fight on that hill on behalf of others, with their blessing of course.

Bizarre. I received a dozen notifications for this while I was writing my notes, but when I finally have the time to catch up, there is one message.

freebeard, why are we talking about your eventual demise?

freebeard is of the tinfoilhat in normal person disguise type, or is it normal in a tinfoilhat disguise?

Either the Gooberment is going to know too much and disappear us, or AI is going to know too much and disappear us.

Ya gots me. :confused:
Lately more of a 304 stainless steel type.

Either/or statements NOT if/then statements NOR exit. This means something. ???

Cheers, freebeard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgQ5_SwwWts

I hope that it suggests cool tinfoil hat videos like it did for me. It showed me two Linus videos.

All of our major life purchases have been paid off for years. We don't carry any debt beyond 30 days, i.e. the credit cards are paid in full each month. (Awfully nice of those folks to give us those short term loans interest free!) Even so we do not have an ideal credit rating. Why? Something you didn't list. "Payment history." We no longer make regular payments on any outstanding debt, such as a car payment or mortgage.

Moral: the credit folks don't like people who don't carry debt.

Credit cards aren't interest free loans, the interest is just hidden in fees that are themselves hidden. They make their money every time you use the card, and stores just roll that into the price of everything. Now that stores are allowed to have different prices for cash and credit, you get to see how interest free the card really is.

Luckily, most places don't do that, so card fees are rolled into your price even if you pay cash. That makes credit, especially rewards cards, a really good move. Regular cards give you convenience and some benefits in return for those fees you can't get out of paying even if you use cash, and rewards cards let you claw back some of it. Using credit means having a buffer that you don't have to pay for: I can get to my savings, but they're not the most liquid. I don't have a box of cash buried in my backyard- my kids have more cash in shoeboxes in their rooms than I have in my pocket. But I've got a ton of purchasing power in that pocket if I really need it.

Payment History" is the same thing as "On-Time Payments" or as I said - Pay your bills on time - every time.

No you won't have ideal credit because you only have one type of debt. Credit history is based on taking credit and the paying it off on time. It really is that simple. Closed accounts (good or bad) only stay on your report for 7 - 10 years. If you wanted to boost your credit history there are lots of options for 0% financing on just about anything big or small.

You should have good credit though and everything I've read and been told once you get to 740 going higher doesn't matter.


My wife an I have identical credit history besides one thing. I leased the Spark for $100 a month in 2016 and she did not. Everything else is in both of our names. That car lease bumped me to 820 while she is at 800. Her credit history is based on credit cards and the mortgage. We haven't had any other types of credit in the past 10 years. Student loans and car loans are all older than that. That is why we are both are careful to keep that one old credit card even though the rewards aren't great and we hardly every use it. As long as it stays open and is reported each month it says on our credit report.

I'm sure you know you can check your credit history for free once a year at annualcreditreport.com

I was the same way until April 27, 2011. I was living in Alabama and we got hit by a Supercell that spawned hundreds of tornadoes. We had some weak ones in the morning that I didn’t think much about until we went for lunch and couldn’t find a restaurant taking cards. We were all in or 20’s and 30’s and no one had any cash. The major tornadoes came through that afternoon and evening and caused massive damage all over the state and surrounding states. Cell networks and ATMs were down for days and we reverted to a cash economy for those that had it.

Since then I’ve kept some cash in the gun safe and $100 in each go bag that we keep in the cars.

We don’t have tornadoes here but we have a 40% chance of a 8.0 or larger earthquake in the next 50 years. Something like that would take down electronic payments for weeks or months.

Gas and groceries are pretty much the only things I need to buy in meatspace to keep things running. I've got a pantry and keep some cash available, so I can keep running in any reasonable disruption. I just don't do the "keep six months of living expenses on hand" thing.

One of my cards has no rewards but is pretty big, so I keep it alive by having one small recurring bill autopay from it.

We have 6 months expenses set aside as an “emergency” fund in a combination of savings and CD. I don’t want that money tied up in investment that might need to be sold in the middle of a recession. The last time we might have needed to tap it was in 2008 / 2009 when the company I worked for went bankrupt and shut down. Not a time to sell