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Debit Card Advantages and Disadvantages

Debit Card Advantages

The main advantage to Debit Cards is they do not affect your credit and you do not need good credit to get one. Basically they have replaced checks as a way to get money out of your bank account.

Normally debit cards do not help your credit. They do not affect your credit history.

Debit Card Fees

It amazes me when average income people use a Debit card pay $2 to $5 to get money from their ATM. 

Broke by a thousand little cuts. 

In my opinion it is crazy to pay $2 to $5 for a $20 or $50 withdrawal, actually any withdrawl.  We get upset about interest rates of 18%. 

A four dollar fee to get $20 from your bank account is 20% charge just to access your money. 

Be very careful of Debit Card Overdraft fees!

Nearly anywhere you can get a Debit Card cash advance you could just pay for your purchase with a debit or credit card.

Debit Card Horror Story

A friend of mine used his debit card for everything.  He normally didn’t have any issues.  One day he forgot about a major bill that went through on his Debit Card.  It went through on a Friday and emptied his account.  


He made seven or eight little purchases over the weekend.  Each purchase went through however the bank nailed him for $20 on each of the purchases. 


The bank would not delete all of their charges.  He ended up with $100 in extra bank fees.  


Fees like this waste a lot of money.  If he used a credit card and paid it off every month he would not have had the overdraft debit card fees.


As if the $2 to $4 debit card fee he paid when he used an ATM was not enough the overdraft fees can kill your bank account.


My Debit Card

I never use my Debit Card, I put all of my expenses on a couple of my credit cards to accumulate points.


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