Don’t use a debit card
With companies going into liquidation due to uncertain financial futures at the moment, I recommend you never purchase an item on a Debit Card. As Frank Abagnale portrayed by Leoardo Decaprio in Catch me if you Can film said in this Google Talk
“Every time you use a debitcard, you put your money and your bank account at risk.”
When you use a credit card, you are borrowing the credit card company’s money to pay your bill and your money is earning interest in a bank account, then at the end of the month when the statement is due you pay it off.
If you purchase a service that was never given or an item that was faulty or never showed , and the provider refuses a refund , then you are protected with your credit card with the service called ChargeBack. You can call up your CreditCard company who will take your information about the service and the reason why you are raising it , and put the money back into your account while they speak with the provider to confirm why this was not delivered.
Also when there’s a large data breach , or your card gets cloned ( Especially when you travel abroad ) and a criminal does somehow get your credit card number and charges $1 million on it, you are protected and your credit card company will cancel the card , remove the amount off your statement send a new one within the next couple of days and lodges a fraud investigation to try and regain the money.
With credit cards, law limits your liability if there’s an unauthorized use of your card so you won’t be responsible for any purchases made. If the same thing happens and the criminals get your debit card information, you will lose the money in your bank account and have a difficult and lengthy time recovering it.
** Next tip , Never , ever , ever borrow money on a credit card
Credit card borrowing rates are up there with PayDay Loans in regards to fees and interest rates. Its cheap for you to borrow from your bank.
I disagree with most of the information here.
A debit card is usually provided as a franchising product by a local bank which uses MasterCard or Visa logos.
When things go wrong and the card holder makes a complain to the bank, he/she has the protection of the consumer law of the country where the card was issued.
Each bank and each country have different regulations but generally speaking even if the bank that issued the debit card bankrupts, there are still the country’s consumer regulations.
I agree with you per post here is an example if me trying to do that: https://recreational-litigant.com/2020/05/20/bankwest-not-honouring-reverse-chargeback-of-transaction/
However with a Debit card the money is already out of your account , and you are fighting to get it back , with a credit card , the money never leaves your account, you just refuse to pay the credit on file
The bankwest post , they refused to reverse the charge , and in the end I had to get the money back from the airline, a credit card If they refuse to reverse it , I just raise an AFCA and possible a vcat against them , but I am fighting them to wipe the credit amount from my file , I am free to spend that money elsewhere in the meantime
Small amounts are fine on debit , but when you are talking about large accounts for credit , you are also losing interest.
Indeed, with a debit card your money is already out and the process to get it back it’s a bit more complicated.
But you can still claim if you didn’t receive the goods or the goods were not as described.
I made a mistake when I paid for goods by direct bank transfer so I was not able to claim anything.
So when possible always use a credit card even if there is a 3% surcharge or alternatively a debit card.
Hopefully, you use a credit card where you get points for spending as well to claw some of that surcharge back! If not see it as a cost for insurance!
Some credit cards give you protection in case you break it in the first few months as well