Wait you actually recommend I use my credit card

Video Transcript

Relying on a credit card to make ends meet is never a great habit to start, but there are definitely some situations where it makes sense to pull out that credit card. So here are a couple of reasons why I would use my credit card instead of my debit card.

First to keep my credit card active, now if you didn't know some credit card issuers will actually close your card if there's no activity for a significant period of time and I unfortunately learned this the hard way through my own personal experiences and so that's why now I like to have at least a small recurring bill on my credit card, to keep it active.

Something as simple as your Netflix bill is enough, keeping your credit card active is important because the longer your card is open, the longer the length of your credit history and therefore the better your credit score!
Another reason why I choose to use my credit card, is for safety. It's not a matter of if someone will steal your card information, it's more of a matter of when I think most of us have found charges on our bank or credit card statements that we definitely didn't make. If a charge is fraudulent of course your credit union bank or credit card lender will refund those charges but it can take time for the fraud teams to perform their research and then fully refund that money back to your account. Now this can be an extremely inconvenient thing if a large amount of money was taken out of your bank account especially, if your rent mortgage or car payment was due.

So using a credit card in high risk places like gas stations or online can help protect the money that's in your bank account from fraud and save you a lot of time and hassle.