subject: One New Credit Card Promise You'll Keep [print this page] It's the time of year - although when isn't it? - for making promises.
New plans and new resolutions are all very well but they're notoriously hard to keep long term and almost as difficult to get started with in the first place.
Go to do a credit card comparison and you'll notice that there are a wealth of credit cards which offer initial deals which are also sort of meant as promises.
That is, promises that the card holder makes to themselves if they're well-versed in the credit card market. For example, in the case of a balance transfer deal: 'I'll pay back this debt within the specified time period to avoid paying interest on it in the future.'
If it was a rewards card the same person might think: 'I'll use this card as long as I'm getting the rewards that I want for my spending and only to the extent that I can pay it off in full at the end of each month.'
It's a test of will, then, in the same way that a new year resolution is a test of will. In a very real sense, also, it's a test of your will against the credit card provider's will to make money.
In both cases cited above they would do this by the card holder carrying a balance and thus paying interest or, more generally, by the card holder not making a payment and thus being subject to fees.
Whether with instant decision credit cards or with a generic application, then, every credit card deal is a promise.
Note also that some cards are promises in themselves. That is, without a deal or an introductory offer being involved.
For example, use abroad credit cards promise to save their holders money abroad.
So if all cards are a promise, of a sort, how can you promise that you'll keep them?
The trick is simply to realise that you are making a promise or a resolution when you use these products. Unlike, say, a debit card when use is simply a replacement for cash, think of these specific bits of plastic as very specific and technical products which each have a very specific use.
The promise you can keep, then, is the one that will get you what you want from the card that you use. Try to frame it in terms as in the examples above: 'in order to get X I need to do Y and no more'.
