How Is Defaulting on Your Credit Card Debt Different Than Robbing a Bank?

I’ve never thought of myself as someone who is highly ethical or ‘honourable’ but as I read more stories of bankruptcies and people trying to dodge paying their bills, I’m beginning to wonder if perhaps I am. I was raised by parents who believed that if you borrowed money you paid it back. To them, defaulting or not paying back your credit card debt is not different than robbing a bank.

Would You Rob a Bank If You Could Get $65,000 for Free?

Let’s say you’re not a violent person. You would never stick a gun or knife in a teller’s face; you would never threaten to detonate a bomb; you wouldn’t even use an explosive to blow open a safe after hours.

But what if you came into a branch and realized you could vault the counter, clear out a till, vault back, and get away. What if you knew the cameras were deactivated and that the only person working was unable to see you enough to recognize you again. What if it was in a town you would never pass through again and from which you could escape from with no problem immediately.

Would you take that jump?

If not, what would stop you from putting all those crisp (well, actually slippery plastic if you’re in Canada) bills in your pocket and running?

Is Refusing to Pay Your Credit Card Bill, Personal Loan or Overdraft OK?

I understand that people can end up in bad situations temporarily due to illness (mental or physical), job loss and various catastrophes. They may be unable to pay their bills or even pay the interest on their loans while they steer through the storm.

Fine.

In time, many of these people successfully navigate back to calmer waters. Once a person is well again and has income coming in again, slightly above what is needed to survive, they need to decide how to handle their debts.

The ones like me would work to put a plan in place to gradually pay off those old debts. It’s the right thing to do. It may take a long, long time. It may mean not getting to follow my dreams. But when I borrowed that money, I knew it wasn’t mine to keep and once I could pay it back, that’s what I’d do.

So I find it quite surprising to read that others have a totally different viewpoint.

Is the Only Reason to Settle Your Debts to Repair Your Credit History So You Can Borrow More?!

I’ve read several anecdotes on financial advice chat boards that made me read them a second time to make sure I wasn’t missing something. (And yes, I know anecdotes can be fake: but the details of some of them suggest they aren’t all lying.)

The common thread is the writer is upset that they have a terrible credit rating because they skipped out on their bills. Usually they had a (somewhat) reasonable reason for going into default. Now that times are better, though, they aren’t interested in setting up a repayment plan. They want to know:

  • How long does it take for their past bad behaviour to become invisible on their credit reports?
  • How little can they offer to pay the companies holding their debts to get them discharged?
  • Can they “buy” a clean credit report by paying some “credit repair firm” to send in letters saying it was all a misunderstanding?

These are people who admit they could pay off the debts in full. They want to get these black marks off their records *so that they can borrow more money!*

How can they justify this to themselves? Don’t they think they should pay back what they owe? Don’t they think future lenders should know the bad way they’ve handled their loans in the past?

Defaulting on Debt Is a Victimless Crime

It’s pretty obvious that these people don’t care that they have stolen money from the businesses from which they borrowed.

Perhaps they justify it to themselves by reading about the “obscene” profits banks make. And the “outrageous 1%” salaries that the bank executives earn.

They may even justify it by saying that credit cards deserve to get ripped off since they charge 20% interest a year on outstanding balances.

I think quite a few of these people would never consider walking into a bank and robbing a teller. But to them, refusing to pay their debts isn’t the same. It’s a victimless crime.

But Just Whose Money Did They Steal?

There’s a common general feeling that “banks have huge amounts of money.” They certainly hold and manage huge amounts of money.

But it’s not *their* money. That mortgage money the bank lent you is actually my money that I invested in GICs at that bank. That credit card loaned you money which you were supposed to pay back when you received your statement. If you don’t pay it back right away, the institution backing the credit card is using money loaned to it by investors to cover your debt.

Banks aren’t using their own personal money to manage debt. They’re balancing what people invest in and through them with what they loan.

When someone defaults on their credit card bill, they are in a real sense robbing the rest of us.

Why Do You Think Credit Cards Can Charge 20% a Year on Balances?

Believe it or not, credit card interest rates actually are reviewed by the government. It may seem like they can charge whatever they want but they actually can’t. (Which is why one of the Payday Loan type places in Ontario is being forced to shut down: they were trying to charge too much money to customers by disguising interest charges under fancy names like account set up fees; account access fees; repayment processing fees, etc.)

The reason the government is permitting these outrageously high credit card interest rates is because the card issuers can show proof of the huge number of people who default on their bills and never pay them.

That’s right. If you are one of those people who skip out on your credit card bills, you are part of the reason why everyone else in the country is stuck with these high interest rates even though they are gradually paying off their own bills.

It’s not a “victimless” crime. It’s a crime that hurts all of us.

Do I Think Credit Card Companies and Banks Are Innocent?

No. I understand that they grant too much credit too easily to too many people. That is a recipe for defaults.

When I was in university, you couldn’t get a credit card until you graduated unless you had a proven steady job.

Now, students are flooded with offers for free credit cards even though they have no steady stream of income to pay them back.

I also see people making minimum-wage being given credit limits in the thousands of dollars. Some will manage that credit very carefully and well. Some will end up impoverished by it.

But I don’t think bad management choices by credit card companies give anyone an excuse to default on their debt.

If you borrowed money and promised to pay it back, you should stick by your word.

What About You? Would You Rob a Bank? Would You Default on Your Loan? How Are Those Actions Different?

I’m genuinely interested in hearing other people’s opinions on this. Do you think it’s ok to default on your credit card or personal loan debt? Do you really think that any reference to that poor behaviour should be removed from your credit history so that future lenders don’t know?

Is it significantly different to rob a bank than to default on credit? Why? How?

Please share your views with a comment.

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Redeeming Petro-Points: Fast, Easy and Effective and I Score a New TV

As I mentioned earlier, we had built up quite a mountain of Petro-Points. For fun (yes, I’m that kind of person) I checked out what the $ value per 1000 points was if I redeemed the points in various ways.  Then, gleefully ignoring all of the results, I went ahead of scored a new TV using the Petro-Points system for a fast, easy and effective reward.

Frankly, it’s all Squawkfox’s fault.

Getting a CAA Membership Using Petro-Points For the Best Reward

I did pay some attention to my own analysis. Using Petro-Points to buy a CAA membership, if (and this is important!) if you are going to get one anyway, is the best $ reward you can get per point.

So when I renewed our CAA memberships this year, I bought each of us the CAA Basic using Petro-Points. Then I redeemed some more points for CAA dollars. Then I phoned CAA and used the CAA dollars to upgrade our CAA memberships to the higher tier with the longer towing distance. We don’t drive to work so what we want towing for is if the car dies on one of our cross-Canada pleasure jaunts. None of those destinations is within 50 km of a gas station, must less 10 km.

The CAA reward also comes with an extra financial bonus I didn’t include in my assessment of the value of Petro-Points: At many places you can use your CAA membership to get a discount of 10% or more. For example, we’ve often saved money on hotels, entrance fees to attractions like the wonderful aquarium in Quebec City, and even eyeglasses. Considering we don’t pay cash for our CAA membership, this 10% off (or more) is like found money.

Anyway, the point is that I spent some Petro-Points on CAA memberships, but I still had a ton left. I even got my Mom a membership when hers expired. (My Dad has OnStar.) And still the mountain was so high I could have retired on it if those were dollars not points.

How Long Can a TV Last?

Unfortunately for my children, my husband and I aren’t big TV fans. So until extremely recently, our newest TV was a cathode-ray tube pseudo-flatscreen 24” RCA. I’m not sure when we got it or how, but I believe it may have involved a relative and President’s Choice points. But that’s another article.

Our older TV pre-dates RCA connectors. Don’t ask.

The problem with these TVs is that, like my Tandy 1000 TL/2, they still work just fine. It’s the world that has moved on and left them bewildered and afraid. They don’t do digital.
Being analog became a problem when the TV networks all switched to broadcasting over-the-air in digital. Actually it didn’t become a problem until we quit buying cable service. Both TVs still worked fine on cable. But neither could understand a signal from an over-the-air antenna unless we bought a digital to analog decoder box. In the USA that would cost $7. Here it would cost about $85.

And to say that neither was “Netflix ready” is a considerable understatement.

Don’t Forget Petro-Points Can be Redeemed for Best Buy e-Gift Cards

Right now, in January 2014, it’s possible to redeem Petro-Points for Best Buy e-Gift cards. These are basically an emailed voucher that can be used to buy stuff from Best Buy. They are not a plastic gift card.

These are not the best use for your Petro-Points. You can save more money by getting Fuel Savings Reward cards topped up online.

Still, they’re a reasonably good use of Petro-Points, considerably better than the value you get for redeeming them for plastic gift cards.

And there’s something strangely appealing about getting a TV for “free.”

So I redeemed most of our mountain of points for Best Buy e-Gift cards. I read the terms carefully first though.

Please note that at the time this was written on January 19, 2014

  • You can use an unlimited number of Best Buy e-Gift cards for an in store purchase but
  • You can only use up to 2 e-Gift cards per transaction if you are buying from Best Buy online. And
  • Lost or stolen e-Gift cards cannot be replaced. (!)

So there is a risk using this method of redeeming your points.

Since I’m foolish enough to take the risk and buy individual stocks on the TSX, it likely comes as no surprise to you that I was also stupid enough willing to take this risk.

How to Redeem Your Petro-Points for Best Buy e-Gift Cards

First, I strongly suggest you read all of the FAQs about Best Buy e-Gift Cards from Petro-Points. Then, read the Terms and Conditions.

If you’re still willing and aren’t being influenced by this post (remember I’m not a licenced financial planner and I’ve been known to give lots of bad advice in the past, just ask my children), here’s what to do:

  1. Go to the Petro-Points website http://retail.petro-canada.ca/en/petropoints/38.aspx
  2. Click on the link to Sign In to your My Petro-Canada account.
    1. In the Email: field, type your email address
    2. In the Password: field, type your password
    3. Click on the Log In arrow.
  3. Under the heading Redeem My Points, click on the Redeem Points button.
  4. Under the Best Buy Canada section, with the graphic for the Best Buy Gift Card, click on the Redeem your points link.
  5. The My Petro-Canada Best Buy Canada e-Gift Card screen will open.
    NOTE: As they say it is *important* to check your email address is correct.
    The e-Gift card will be sent to that email address. So if you thought it was funny to register for a Petro-Canada account as, say Donald_trump@Gmail.com, you want to be careful, or the Trumpster will be out at Best Buy spending your hard-won dollars tomorrow.
    Click the next step button.
  6. On the Step 1 of 4 : Confirm your email address screen
    1. Look at the email address and make sure it’s the one you want to receive the Best Buy certificate.
    2. If it’s ok, click on the confirm button.
  7. On the Step 2 of 4: Choose your e-Gift Card demomination [sic] screen
    The choices are

    • $10 Best Buy e-Gift card for 12 000 Petro-Points
    • $25 (30 000 points)
    • $50 (60 000 points)
    • $100 (120 000 points)
    • $250 (300 000 points)
    • $500 (600 000 points)
    1. Click to select the radio button beside the amount of points you want to redeem for a specific number of Best Buy $.
      NOTE: You may have to repeat this whole process a few times if you need to get a large $$ value in gift cards. Remember you are limited as to how many e-Gift cards you can redeem in a single online purchase. Check the limit before buying!
    2. Click on the redeem button.
  8. On the Step 3 of 4: Confirm your Order screen
    Confirm the order.
    Your e-Gift card will be generated and sent to your email address.
  9. Sign out of your My Petro-Canada account.
  10. Check your email inbox for the e-Gift Card. You can print it to take to a Best Buy store, or use the code on it to enter at Best Buy online. (Remember you are limited as to how many e-Gift cards you can redeem in a single online purchase. Check the limit before buying!)Your email message will be something like the following:
    Congratulations! You have successfully redeemed 120,000, 000,000 Petro-Points™ for a $100 000 e-Gift Card for Best Darn Buy Canada.
    Please visit ExtremlyLongURL.com to access your e-Gift Card, or copy and paste it into the “Address” field of your web browser and follow the instructions to access your e-Gift Card.
    Your secret code is: SomethingReallyUnlikely
    Your selection: Best Darn Buy $100 000 e-Gift Card
    Your transaction number: extremely long number that should be in scientific notation
    Amount of certificate: 100 000
    Reference numbers: like transaction number but with bells on
    Number of points redeemed: 120,000, 000, 000
    Questions about your Best Buy e-Gift Card redemption? Give us a call at these numbers.

What Happened When I Went to Redeem my Best Buy e-Gift Cards to Score a New TV?

So, with my e-Gift cards, which are really pieces of printer paper, clutched hotly in hand, I drove off to Best Buy to get my TV.

What happened next? Did I need to call CAA? Did the FutureShop S.W.A.T. team take me down?

Hopefully I’ll get around to sharing that inglorious moment in another post soon. Suffice it to say, it may be entitled “Why I Think Best Buy Needs to Call the Geek Squad for Their Online ‘Reserve and Pick Up’ System.”

But while you’re waiting, or even if you aren’t, from the point of view of the Petro-Points redemption and the Best Buy e-Gift Card redemptions themselves, all went very well. I found both of those parts quite satisfactory.

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Join In
Do you always redeem your reward points to earn the most value per point, or do you sometimes redeem them for the slightly-wasteful-but-more-emotionally-satisfying experience of picking up something for “free”? Please share your experiences with a comment.