i don't guess we got our first uh credit card oh back in the seventies early seventies uh when i first got married was a Visa card uh issued out of a Liberty Bank in Oklahoma City because my
uh-huh
uh-huh
sister worked at the uh
uh the Visa Bank Americard
center there so we were still in college and had she not worked there i'm not sure that i would have qualified
uh-huh
they've come in handy over the years
yeah
uh and they have become or
also a
a real bother sometimes
oh tell me about it
especially you know if you catch yourself short on cash or if you're on vacation it's just easier to put everything on a card
uh-huh
uh-huh
and uh i find if you're not careful you wind up uh a month or so
staring those bills in the face and you go i don't remember doing all that stuff and it adds up
yeah they add up quick
so sometimes uh especially traveling with TI you know everything goes on American Express
uh-huh
uh-huh
and it makes it a whole lot easier for bookkeeping
yeah
but uh as far as personal life goes i guess i really try to use them as little as possible uh
i kind of like having them for uh gasoline purchases
yeah we like to keep one on hand just for emergencies you know
yeah
but
but other than that uh i i guess over the years tried to avoid the national credit card syndrome of just putting everything on there day after day after day and then then you really get socked to it if you don't watch it
uh-huh
yeah
how how do you
look at credit credit cards
we just uh quit using them and they got us in trouble we took a loan and paid them all off
that's
we keep them uh we keep uh one gas card and uh and uh Visa just you know in case there's an emergency or something but other than that we don't use them anymore
right
well that's kind of the way we were coming it's it's uh i guess for that very reason that that uh
uh-huh
if you're not real conscious of what you're doing
uh-huh
it's just too much by the time you get well if you got a bunch of cards you get a bunch of bills every month and for some strange reason those people think they need to get paid
um-hum
i know isn't that funny
yeah
and i give them maybe not maybe they're not really concerned about getting paid because they're know if you don't then they're adding on what eighteen nineteen twenty percent sometimes it's twenty two percent interest
yeah
yeah yeah and then some of them add late fees on it and say they don't get paid and
yeah
i guess that's one of the motivations behind the the uh
um-hum
huh
the uh American Express card with TI there's no with the American Express card from TI there's no um
huh
uh uh
late fee there's no uh interest rate you either you either pay the thing off or they come get it
oh really
and it's turned into personnel and they come get you
so they've got quite a bit more motivation i think to get paid then
oh yeah
then some of the others do
yeah
but that's the one that your cost center manager sees every month
uh-huh
so you're
a little bit more careful about what you put on that even though you can use it however you want to
can you use that one for personal use
oh yeah
oh you can
you can use it like any other card
uh-huh
and uh
oh i see huh
but it you know you kind of you know that somebody every month and who knows how many people are looking at those uh
um-hum
bills that come in and those statements you're not the only one
um-hum
yeah
so
you uh you want to make sure that
uh is that okay is that okay okay that those people see what it is that you are buying and most of the time it is
yeah
but most of the others i've sent back i mean all you get is card offers i've got three card offers now uh from gas companies and uh Visa Gold and
uh-huh
uh some other bank uh Citibank i think is always sending the Visa stuff out
and i usually just throw them away because i you know
oh i do too i don't even open them much i throw them out
i don't want another one i don't want to have to mess with it you know you carry around a wallet full of
credit cards and uh
uh-huh
one of these days it's going to all be full
a girlfriend of mine found uh uh it was a Visa or MasterCard she found the ad for one in like a Good Housekeeping Housekeeping magazine for eleven percent
oh that's not bad
so i said shoot i need one of those
yeah no if they don't say no annual membership on them i'll throw them away um
uh-huh
years ago well that i had my Visa card through this bank in Oklahoma City for
uh-huh
oh probably fifteen years and then they star ted charging uh annual membership fees
um-hum
and i said adios i'm you know i'm not paying you
why do they do that
it's just another way to make money as far as i can tell i mean they've been
i mean
i mean they get enough you know on the interest
well sure
and they i guess they figure they've got enough people out there with cards they're going to get cards at uh twenty bucks a pop
uh-huh
uh-huh
there's going to be that much more
uh-huh
uh so then a couple years ago i found uh a bank here in Plano that if you kept a minimum balance in any kind of account whether it was a savings account or what it was you can get a Visa card through them and no annual membership
uh-huh
so i went over and just stuck three hundred dollars in my son's savings account in his name and
got my Visa card so as long as they have no annual membership fee i it would be okay but i can't see paying someone to use their card be charged that eighteen percent interests
uh-huh
huh
no i can't either
yeah
so yeah i think you're right the best philosophy is have them if you need them but otherwise leave them tucked away somewhere
yeah yeah really gets a lot of people in in trouble
yeah
yeah it sure does maybe they're counting on that i don't know
well i guess that's it thanks for talking
okay nice talking to you bye-bye
bye
