Well, it depends, for people who do a lot of travelling and online shopping they are quite popular all over the world, as an easy way to add one layer of insulation between your own money and businesses you don’t know if you can trust.
In Australia, most credit cards have an annual fee, and they pretty much all just offer frequent flyer miles. US cards have much better perks: Quite a few offer 2% cashback, cards with points offer more points than Aussie cards, they almost all include extended warranty and rental car coverage, some include mobile phone protection, etc. If you pay it off in full every month, you get these perks for “free”.
Of course, merchants pay the price for these perks, given the high fees to process credit cards. They can make merchants pay a 3% fee, pay 2% cashback to customers on some of their cards, and still make more money from card fees than they would in other countries. Visa and Mastercard used to require merchants in the US to not charge any extra fees for accepting credit cards, but after a big lawsuit, this is no longer the case. Stores are slowly becoming like Aussie stores - charging extra if you pay by card.
In the US, it’s also very important to build up your credit score, as this affects loan rates for mortgages, cars, personal loans, etc. Most people build their score by getting a credit card as early as possible and using it often.
Does anyone outside the US even use credit cards?
Only debit and I only use it because I get cashback.
Without that I couldnt care less and would go nack to PayPal and SEPA.
Well, it depends, for people who do a lot of travelling and online shopping they are quite popular all over the world, as an easy way to add one layer of insulation between your own money and businesses you don’t know if you can trust.
They have far fewer perks, so it’s not as common.
In Australia, most credit cards have an annual fee, and they pretty much all just offer frequent flyer miles. US cards have much better perks: Quite a few offer 2% cashback, cards with points offer more points than Aussie cards, they almost all include extended warranty and rental car coverage, some include mobile phone protection, etc. If you pay it off in full every month, you get these perks for “free”.
Of course, merchants pay the price for these perks, given the high fees to process credit cards. They can make merchants pay a 3% fee, pay 2% cashback to customers on some of their cards, and still make more money from card fees than they would in other countries. Visa and Mastercard used to require merchants in the US to not charge any extra fees for accepting credit cards, but after a big lawsuit, this is no longer the case. Stores are slowly becoming like Aussie stores - charging extra if you pay by card.
In the US, it’s also very important to build up your credit score, as this affects loan rates for mortgages, cars, personal loans, etc. Most people build their score by getting a credit card as early as possible and using it often.