Posts by George Barrett35

You really ought to double-check that directly with the retailer..

Kimberly Nguyen said:I know exactly what you’re getting at here, I really do.

Let’s try looking at it this way... 🙂

For instance,
say you're sitting there with an overdraft at Chase $2.00, and your wife has about $3,000 in the red... let's assume that over time—because of, you know, life happening—you both end up buried in the hole. Then payday hits.
You're back at zero, but your spouse is still deep in the negative $200 and for the next few months, you have absolutely nothing to work with except your bare salaries (let's say $7,400 total), all while the bank hits you with interest charges every three months like clockwork. What now? The debt isn't shrinking, income isn't going up, costs are "only" climbing, and there's nowhere else to turn... it's a nightmare scenario.

What I was trying to get across is that an overdraft isn't some bottomless magic bag where you can just pull money out without consequences; once you've tapped it out, you're left with nothing but your raw paycheck again.

Exactly like this 👍

Now you're struggling just to survive on your salary, let alone how you expect to pay that debt back—meaning living on a fraction of your pay while throwing the rest at the deficit. And what happens when you retire and that income drops to maybe a third of what it is now? Not to mention the possibility of interest rates being one-sided and spiking significantly if the dollar fluctuates slightly

If people actually viewed an overdraft for what it really is—just a standard loan but with the most predatory interest rates on the market and the "perk" of only being able to pay off the interest—they certainly wouldn't be using them so recklessly
.
Honestly, I'd take a revolving credit card over an overdraft any day because even if the interest is high, it actually forces you to slowly chip away at the principal (assuming you can't qualify for a traditional loan, which is always the superior move if you're stuck in that position)

To be more precise, all you really need is your ID—and your Social Security number, if you haven't committed that to memory yet. There isn't even a requirement for an initial deposit at this stage.

briskbison28 said:I’m fairly certain the answer is no, but you could always head down to Chase and ask one of the tellers if you're feeling adventurous...

Sure you can, provided you have a legal guardian standing right there with you.

Nicole Adams said:You can certainly have your own checking account as a minor, but you'll need to bring along one of your parents' IDs since they have to be listed as joint owners on the account.

Even then, you aren't just bringing their ID; you actually need one of your parents physically present to sign off.

I wouldn't go that far. Foreign coins generally aren't accepted just about anywhere here.

silentowl7 said:Wrong. It absolutely has everything to do with the card limit. Mine is $2000 and I can pull $2000 all at once without any issues.

What kind of card are you even using to have a limit of $2000?

The ATM withdrawal limit is $1667 and it’s a completely different beast than your card limit. If your card limit is lower, sure, you're going to walk away with less cash, just like how you can't pull out $5,000 if your checking account balance is sitting at a measly couple hundred bucks

You aren't looking at an installment plan here, you're dealing with a credit line because it’s clearly a revolving card. If you’re set on using Amex, your best bet right now is grabbing the Delta SkyMiles card since they waive the annual fees for the first year.

The monthly interest rate sits at 5%.

Sure, regarding that American Express. But you have to realize that interest-free installment plans aren't just some automatic setting; they're an option. It all comes down to the merchant—some offer it and others don't, or sometimes they only bring it out during specific promotional events or sales.

Alright, thanks for the correction...
I was just talking out of my ass there for no reason.

rapidsailor46, look, you really need to have a permanent employment contract in place. You’re acting like it’s 2001 when you bought that computer on checks, but we’re in 2008 now and the landscape has shifted. Or maybe we're just talking about different banks entirely. This guy has an account at Chase, and I'm specifically talking about Chase. Sure, you can get up to 20 checks, but you absolutely have to have the funds sitting in your account to cover every single one issued (roughly $333 per check). Even if you're only pulling five checks, you still need the full coverage, which basically implies you already have enough liquid cash to pay for the whole thing upfront anyway.

To land a credit card—specifically an American Express—you don't actually have to jump through any special hoops. All you need to do is fill out the application and attach a couple of pay stubs. It all boils down to your income level; whether or not you have a permanent employment contract isn't even the deciding factor here. There's no need for notaries, co-signers, endless paperwork, official seals, or Bon 2 forms...

When I mentioned the company would be paying $7,000, I was factoring in the interest over those two years. They aren't going to save a dime by opting for a standard consumer loan because the interest rate spreads are practically non-existent, and honestly, those secondary loans often end up carrying even higher rates.

You’ll need to get an overdraft protection limit approved on your checking account first, which essentially requires you to have a permanent, full-time employment contract in place. Once you’ve checked that box, you can start looking into using a Maestro card for installment payments.

But let's be real, you aren't going to be stretching those payments out over 24 months; you'll be lucky if you can squeeze them into six, assuming the merchant even offers an installment plan to begin with.

If you want my honest advice, just go ahead and apply for an Amex card, because that's the only way you'll actually be able to consider a repayment period that long.

Yeah, they just grab a Sharpie, scrawl your name on it, and call it a day. You’ll have to wait a bit, obviously, but it’s nothing crazy—maybe about a week tops.

Not even close.

Donna Wilson18 said:I guess I don't quite get it then—I was looking at the holiday special on the Target website where they mention 'pay with a credit card in 12 installments.' Wouldn't it just be way simpler to just pay the full amount normally and let that 5% cashback hit the account every month?

It’s exactly like an Amex deal. If you opt for that "12 monthly installments" thing, they literally just slice the total price into twelve equal chunks with zero interest, and instead of hitting your entire credit limit at once, only that single monthly installment counts against your available credit. In this scenario, the retailer is essentially footing the bill for you, much like a check. That’s why you can't just walk into any store and demand that specific setup...
If you choose the "normal" route to grab that 5% cashback, you're using a revolving line of credit, which means the full purchase amount hits your limit immediately. Naturally, that comes with interest if you don't clear it. In that case, the bank is the one lending you the money. And since it's the bank providing the credit rather than the shop, you can do that at pretty much any merchant that accepts your card...

Why on earth should everyone be getting a check?

Look, here’s the deal: JP Morgan Chase will approve you for a charge card based on whatever cash you’ve got sitting in your savings account. Of course, they aren't going to greenlight it the second you drop the money in there; you have to stick around for a while and prove you're actually a reliable client. And honestly, why would anyone bother locking up a CD just to act as collateral for a credit card? Does that imply you’d have to hand the card back once the term expires? It doesn't make sense. Even having a steady paycheck hitting your account isn't some ironclad guarantee. If someone keeps a decent balance in an account like that over a long period, it's pretty obvious they have enough liquidity to live on and likely have a job somewhere. Besides, there’s really no need to run a full credit check since you aren't asking for a revolving line of credit—it's just a charge card. You get billed once a month on whatever date you pick.

Terry Howard said:Not quite. I've got a Wells Fargo card set to USD and I have zero issues pulling cash from ATMs back home in the States.

I think you missed my point entirely. Of course you can pull local currency from an ATM in America because those machines only stock what's local, but I’m talking about the actual currency of the card itself. You can withdraw pounds in England, euros in France, or whatever else you need, but only if your account is actually holding dollars. If you had a bunch of euros sitting in an account tied specifically to a USD card, you wouldn't be able to withdraw anything at all. That’s why it’s absolutely vital that the account holds the exact same currency as the card—whatever that may be—rather than just relying on the local money of wherever you happen to be standing.

"A little hiccup at the starting line," lol.

Look, since we were already digging through the internet looking for info on those less competent outfits, the foreign transaction fee from Bank of America for using an ATM or a card terminal abroad is 2%—minimum.$6.75 Or whatever that works out to in another currency.

Kimberly Nguyen said:Hmm...

I really can't get behind that logic at all.

The fees for hitting an ATM abroad don't depend on the local laws of the country you're visiting; they depend entirely on the fee schedule set by your own card issuer.

If what you're saying were actually true, bank fee schedules would be millions of pages long, listing every single tiny regulation for every different country, instead of just having one universal fee for international withdrawals.

I can't speak for every bank out there since I personally use Intel, but honestly, the smartest move is to just keep everything in dollars because that's how all the transactions are processed...
Look, if you're withdrawing pounds, common sense might suggest you should have pounds in your account, but that's actually a mistake because you'll end up losing way more on those exchange rate spreads.
The bank takes the pounds, converts them back to dollars, and then converts those dollars into pounds again.
If you already have the base currency ready to go, you avoid that ridiculous double conversion mess.

That’s a fundamental misunderstanding right there. The Intel cards issued here for foreign currency accounts are hardcoded to a specific currency based on what you choose when you open the account. As far as I know, most American banks only give you the option of USD, EUR, or CHF. Once that card is printed and tied to a specific currency, an ATM, a card reader, or any electronic transfer system will only recognize that one specific currency. To put it bluntly, if you have pounds sitting in your account but your card is designated as a dollar card, you won't be able to withdraw a single cent in London, New York, or anywhere else—unless you go talk to a teller at a branch. So, if you plan on using the card abroad, make sure the money in your account matches the currency on the card; otherwise, you're going to get hit with massive exchange rate differences and fees, which are set by your issuing bank regardless of where you happen to be standing.

EDIT: Alright, I just did some digging into Chase's fine print, and it looks like they really do tie almost all card usage to the dollar, which is a pretty inconvenient setup, especially for anyone doing business in other currencies.