There is a book written by Sophie
Kinsella entitled ‘Confessions of a Shopaholic’. If you don’t like to read especially chick
flick novel like me, you can always watch the movie that made from the
best-seller novel. The novel or movie shows a good example on consequence if
someone has too many credit cards and hunted by the credit card debt because
he/she can’t afford to pay them. The story might be fictional but what happened
in that story is a reality. It can happen to anyone that can’t resist in
spending money on unnecessary things or tempted by sales which frequently held
in almost every department store in our country. I even have seen such thing happened in my
family. My sister who used to refuse to apply for any credit card is now have
to face with RM12000 card credit debt. Meanwhile, my father has to answer a
phone call from credit card debt collector everyday from two credit cards that
he applied 10 years ago and overspent by my mother who can’t control her
spending during that time. If I have a time machine, I probably will go 10
years back and advised my parents not to apply for any credit cards since I knew
they can’t afford to pay it back unlike my sister. Now, they have to pay the
debt that probably takes their lifetime to settle.
From these 2 lessons that I
learn from my family, obviously I would say that credit card is an evil. But do
we really need it? Most of department stores, restaurants and services take
debit card now. Debit card is always better than credit card because you use
your own money instead of borrowing from others (banks) and you have to pay the
money with certain interest rates. Of course it is better than personal loan.
But that is not the issue here. The issue is what if you don’t have any money
in your account and your debit card is not useful anymore. That is when people
see the advantage of credit card although there is a bad consequence follows.
Credit card is like a magic that offered by some wizards which can bring you
happiness but happiness comes with price to pay. Say no to happiness is probably
hard but it is better than suffer forever. People who can’t afford to pay
credit card should not applied it in any condition and always remember if you
have something that you want to buy and the number in your account is not
enough, that thing can wait until the end of the month. Even credit card just
takes 5 minutes minimum to apply plus it can be done online and you think you
can resist yourself from spending, my advice is still don’t because once you
have it, your ability to control yourself will be fade just like your money
that you think you will have in the future.
