Live data from Hacker News

Credit card debt collection

bitsaboutmoney.com

201–210 of 568 posts

Re: Credit card debt collection

#201
post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> TIL: Credit cards are banned in Europe. /s They are not banned. They are heavily regulated in many European countries. In several of them: - Cashback systems are simply banned. - Credit card are by default Debit Card. The credit option need to be opt-in. - Credit Card payments spread over several months are discouraged or simply banned by default. Credit cards are also much more rare. With an average of ~1 Credit C…

> Credit card are by default Debit Card Credit cards are credit cards, even in Europe. It's just that banks issue debit cards, rather than credit cards and I think that the point. You're financial business in much of the EU is between you and your bank, not some third party credit card company. The debit cards rides on top of the networks built by VISA and MasterCard (and others) for the credit card industry, but the…

> Credit cards are credit cards, even in Europe. It's just that banks issue debit cards, rather than credit cards and I think that the point

Partially but not exactly.

France "CB" are labelled "Visa" (not Visa Debit nor V-Pay) or "MasterCard" (Not Maestro nor MasterCard debit).

Their interchange system will make these card accepted mostly everywhere where Credit Card are accepted.

They are accepted even where Visa Debit or MasterCard Debit are refused (e.g Airlines ticket, Car Rental, Some Hotel booking).

And still they are all debit cards by default with instant payment taken from your bank account.

Re: Credit card debt collection

#202
post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Federal Reserve already overprints, that’s one reasonwhy the USD and almost every other major currency is currently struggling. Printing more money during high inflation only worsens the problems.

Maybe. But in that case, adding more consumer spending via consumer credit would be a negative, not a positive? (Only money that's actually being actively spent makes a difference. If the Fed prints oodles of money but buries it in their backyard, it would have no impact on inflation.)

> adding more consumer spending via consumer credit would be a negative, not a positive?

In a way yeah. I mean you increase demand for goods/services without an equivalent increase in productivity you just end up with higher prices (of course the idea is that "economic" stimulus still tends to increase productivity somewhat, just by a lower % than the increase in money supply. That generally seems to be fair).

Re: Credit card debt collection

#203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

same experience, except it wasn't that simple. A family member told me I should settle with them, because that's what they did too. They wiped the balance and closed the account but the settlement stayed on my credit score for 7 years. I had a friend who was getting calls by a debt servicer and was making it seem like no big deal. I told my friend to ask the person about the 7 years, the person reluctantly admitted t…

Just a heads up for people living in the EU, it is possible to have things like negative credit ratings removed on grounds of GPRD.

Do you have a source that specifically states I can get a bad debt scrubbed from my credit rating under GDPR provisions? It doesn’t match my understating of GDPR at all.

Re: Credit card debt collection

#204
post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moreover, it's an inequality engine. Get money from those who can't pay their bills (poor - they are punished bad back-breaking late fees and penalties) to those who can (middle class and the rich who usually pay their cards off in full every month so never pay any interest, and get cashbacks and bonuses/airline miles/etc).

A lot of the American consumer finance infrastructure seems to be set up like a regressive tax on poor people who can’t avoid using the system. If you don’t have money, banks will charge you $15 / month for a basic checking account, plus $50 overdraft fees if you make the slightest mistake in balancing the account (or if a company makes a fraudulent charge on your account — also dismayingly easy in the US system). If…

Why is the market like this? It's naturally harder to make money off poor people because they have less money. It's also not how retail banking works in Europe, they tend to make money off the rich here in ridiculous ways ("keep $400,000 frozen on your deposit for an almost zero interest rate and get a few useless perks like a red-carpet priority lane at the airport"). And i don't think it's regulation. Maybe European poor and American poor are different (can't do the math, don't care, have planning horizon too short)?

Re: Credit card debt collection

#205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

same experience, except it wasn't that simple. A family member told me I should settle with them, because that's what they did too. They wiped the balance and closed the account but the settlement stayed on my credit score for 7 years. I had a friend who was getting calls by a debt servicer and was making it seem like no big deal. I told my friend to ask the person about the 7 years, the person reluctantly admitted t…

Just a heads up for people living in the EU, it is possible to have things like negative credit ratings removed on grounds of GPRD.

... only if they're no longer considered necessary for the purpose of judging your creditworthiness. So in practice you're unlikely to get anything expunged ahead of schedule, filing a complaint only makes sense if the credit reporting agency kept your data for longer than they said they would (in Germany, this is 3 years at most).

Re: Credit card debt collection

#206
post #150
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Singapore has many systems, rules and laws that would not and could not work elsewhere. It's great that it works for them, but it doesn't work in the USA, or most other countries. I will point out that they are an affluent, monocultural, somewhat xenophobic, authoritarian and borderline fascist city-state.

Singapore has only recently become affluent, mostly thanks to hard work by the locals, but also partially thanks to policies that did not discourage people from putting in that hard work. I'm not sure what you mean by monocultural? Singapore is famously multicultural. Singapore is very open to foreigners. Almost no one's family has been here for longer than three or four generations. I'm not sure where you get xenoph…

> To call them 'borderline fascist' you'd need a rather torturous definition of fascism (or a generous definition of borderline).

Does hanging people arrested with small enough amounts of drugs that you'd get a relatively minor punishment in the U.S. not at least toe the borderline of fascism?

Re: Credit card debt collection

#207

Article is great, (with it being written by pat mckenzie that is almost tautological) > The value of portfolios is a huge discount to the face value of the debts; at the point where a lender has only worked it themselves and the debt is a few months delinquent, portfolios generally fetch about 5 cents on the dollar. That value will continue to decay over time. I agree with his point directionally (the value of the so…

debt collection by banks is muuuch higher than 5 %.

Even by standardized credit numbers, it is more like 60 %

Re: Credit card debt collection

#208
post #126
post #91

It might be a very European view to the problem but: Why does the American government does even tolerate this credit card garbage business in the first place ? We are in the 21th century. Most payment can be validated electronically and processed under 200ms. I can pay something with my phone and get money taken directly from my bank account within seconds. There is absolutely no need of Credit Cards where Debit Card…

Someone mentioned fraud protection, to be more explicit: With credit cards, you haven't truly paid until the credit card bill gets paid. So, if you have a dispute, you don't have to pay the disputed amount until the dispute is resolved. With a debit card, you've already paid, and so you're out the money until the dispute is resolved. Now, if the dispute is not resolved in your favor, you may have to pay interest on t…

It is a tool, I agree, but like any other tool it can be excessively pushed and alternatives can be prioritized or not.

As far as I can say, with a European state of mind, is that a credit card poses a risk and temptation for the average person. Not everyone is financially responsible, many times simply due to lack of proper financial education, and they deserve a little attention.

Re: Credit card debt collection

#209
>> I did this over the Internet, on my own volition, because it seemed pro-social and I was extremely underused by my actual job at the time

I'd just like to credit the author for acknowledging what virtually no one these days is willing to admit about their true motivations.

Re: Credit card debt collection

#210
post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Singapore has only recently become affluent, mostly thanks to hard work by the locals, but also partially thanks to policies that did not discourage people from putting in that hard work. I'm not sure what you mean by monocultural? Singapore is famously multicultural. Singapore is very open to foreigners. Almost no one's family has been here for longer than three or four generations. I'm not sure where you get xenoph…

> To call them 'borderline fascist' you'd need a rather torturous definition of fascism (or a generous definition of borderline). Does hanging people arrested with small enough amounts of drugs that you'd get a relatively minor punishment in the U.S. not at least toe the borderline of fascism?

No, it's well known to everyone everywhere that trafficking drugs into Singapore will get you a death sentence. Those drugs destroy families, they absolutely destroy families.
Post reply on HN