{"id":650,"date":"2007-06-04T07:36:09","date_gmt":"2007-06-04T07:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/?p=650"},"modified":"2019-12-05T20:35:04","modified_gmt":"2019-12-05T12:35:04","slug":"misleading-credit-card-advertising","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/mathematics\/misleading-credit-card-advertising-650","title":{"rendered":"Misleading credit card advertising"},"content":{"rendered":"

This flyer arrived in my mailbox recently, from Standard Chartered Bank.<\/p>\n

Visa<\/a>
\nClick image to see full size scan.<\/small><\/p>\n

It is certainly pushing the envelope when it comes to ethical advertising.<\/p>\n

This is especially galling:<\/p>\n

\n

Now you can own anything, any time, anywhere... You can shop for designer brands or indulge in a holiday with ease.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Really? And when and where do I need to pay for it? No time? No where?<\/p>\n

Now the really misleading bit:<\/p>\n

\n

Every purchase above $100 will automatically be converted into 24 monthly instalments at an attractive interest rate of 5% p.a. along with a small administration fee.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

That \"small\" administrative fee is actually 6%. In the small print:<\/p>\n

\n

The effective interest rate is 9.32% p.a.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

What? This is a lot more than an \"attractive 5%\"!<\/p>\n

The offer of $100 rebate also sounds good. From the fine print:<\/p>\n

\n

To qualify for the $100 cash rebate, you must spend a minimum transaction amount of $500 within one month of receiving your card.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

So $500 at 9.32% for 2 years, that's $93.20 in interest that you have to pay the bank. So you are really only getting a $6.80 rebate. Hmmm... And if you spend over $500, that rebate is capped at $100.<\/p>\n

This advertising is very dangerous. The majority of the population do not bother to work out the real interest they are paying on credit cards.<\/p>\n

Do yourself a favour. Do not take up this offer.<\/p>\n

Check out more on the math of Credit Cards<\/a>.<\/p>\n

See the 4 Comments<\/a> below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A recent credit card advertisement is very questionable. Beware the fine print on these things...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=650"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12300,"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650\/revisions\/12300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intmath.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}