Let me talk about a mishap I had. It happened to me only once. I always try to pay my credit card bills on time. Unfortunately, it seems that I am doing quite a disservice to the merchants by doing that. I have two credit cards: one that I use daily, and one from my bank that I keep as a reserve.
I have travelled for the government. My first trips were to Australia and London. I paid everything with my credit card, for a total of $20,000. I made a mistake when I paid my bills on the Internet. I paid $20,000 on the one that had an outstanding balance of $150, and I paid $150 on the other one. Three weeks later, I received a letter saying that the amount of $19,500 would be credited to my first card. How useful was that! Of course, my payment for the other balance was late. I immediately used the credit of $19,500 to pay. For the first time in my life I went over the 21-day limit and my payment was late. The interest charge was about $2,500, for a 21-day delay. It seems to me that the provisions on usurious rates in the Criminal Code are much lower than that. Finally, after one and a half hours of discussion, I said that I would end 21 years of good cooperation and then I received proposals from other credit card companies. I am going to switch companies.
I still cannot believe that such high amounts can be charged for such a short delay, because of a simple mistake.
Furthermore, merchants in shopping centres in my riding told me that more and more they are compelled to accept credit card payments whereas before people paid cash.
