Farmall Cub

I'm trying to spend a good deal of money on a spa but I can't seem to get it spent. Costco had an on-line offer for the spa I wanted,$1,000 off plus price included shipping and handling. Really a good deal. Same spa is close to $2,000 more elsewhere. My only credit card has a $4,000 dollar limit and I have excellent credit. Called Capital One to get the limit raised to $6,000 so I could use it to by the spa. I've had that card for at least 15 years and they denied my request. Told them what they could do with their card! Guess it's because I pay any balance off each month when I get the statement. Called my bank and applied for a visa through them and was approved for $10,000 limit but the card won't get to me in time to to take advantage of the one time deal. Finally, had to use my debit card after getting them to approve the one time large purchase, which is only authorized for two days. Finally got the deal done and noticed on the order confirmation, Costco ordered the wrong cabinet style. Called them and told them what happened and asked them to change cabinet style to the one I ordered. I was told they can't just change an order they have to cancel it, which takes 24 hours to complete, and I would have to reorder. Haven't received my new credit card yet so I'll have to go through the debit card thing all over again. Remember when you could write a check to buy something!

I remember when you waited until you had the cash to buy something.

Poppy, if you are inferring that Brent doesn't have the money to buy the spa, you have read his post wrong. He is in such good shape, that his credit has not been extended higher and higher as needs increased. His check most likely, would not happen in time for the on-line purchase to be good. Way to go Brent! Steve K.

Yeah, Brent I understand your frustration. I also remember both when you saved up the cash and when you could simply write a good cheque on your bank account. However, it appears you do things the way we do -- use the VISA for most daily purchases and pay the bill in it's entirety when the bill comes in. Old saying - never ever use your own money when someone else's will do the same job. Just don't leave a balance and there is zero interest.

Course up here with Costco you gotta have an AMEX card and for us that ain't every happenin agin.... so debit/cash is how we deal with Costco.

And yeah I agree with Steve cause that is how I read it as well. We have the same problem. Credit Card companies love to see customers carry a balance

More confusion. Turns out Costco on line wouldn't accept my debit card because they would have to put the transation through within two days. They don't pay the vendor until the spa is shipped,four to six weeks from now. Went to the local Costco today and bought one of their Cash Cards and used that to buy the spa. If it wasn't such a good deal and for Costco's excellent return policy, I would have told them to do something not so nice with their spa! And, yes I was trying to pay for the thing not charge it.

Surely you realize that if all this works out, you will then be in hot water!

My niece (who is a whiz with money and really is thrifty) and her husband opened a small trucking company with just 4 trucks. Business was brisk and they stayed busy. She applied for and received a gas card with a major oil company. The drivers used the card and every month she paid the bill. Never had a balance so she didn't have any interest to pay. The following year she received notice her card would not be renewed. She called the company and they told her that since she paid her balance monthly they didn't feel they were getting their share of the pie. She had to go to another company and get another card. Then the local station she was doing business (quite a lot of it) with called her and wanted to know what they had done to lose her business. She referred them to their home office.

Credit card companies are fun. I have a visa card from Shell, serviced by Citibank, which had a good deal on gas. It only had a $1000 limit. Unknown to me it only had $10 to hit the limit one time when I went to buy gas. The pump started and pumped $55 worth of gas. I asked for an increase in the limit. Told no since I was irresponsible and had exceeded the limit. Fair enough. The card is no longer in use and I'm generally using Phillips. I did not cancel the old card, simply cut it up. Let them send me notices of change and such things for a while before they cancel it. I too believe it had more to do with paying the balance to avoid interest charges than a few bucks over. I do know my credit acore. Part of a credit score is the ratio of credit used verses the amount off available credit thus not using it creates a higher score than cancelling it. Thanks Shell/visa/Citibank. The replacement card with a higher limit is from ...Citibank who offered a $250 bribe....err rebate and zero interest on charges for one year to take out the card and charge $2000 on it in three months. $250 is not a typo. I have spent it. Vern

v w wrote:Credit card companies are fun. I have a visa card from Shell, serviced by Citibank, which had a good deal on gas. It only had a $1000 limit. Unknown to me it only had $10 to hit the limit one time when I went to buy gas. The pump started and pumped $55 worth of gas. I asked for an increase in the limit. Told no since I was irresponsible and had exceeded the limit. Fair enough. The card is no longer in use and I'm generally using Phillips. I did not cancel the old card, simply cut it up. Let them send me notices of change and such things for a while before they cancel it. I too believe it had more to do with paying the balance to avoid interest charges than a few bucks over. I do know my credit acore. Part of a credit score is the ratio of credit used verses the amount off available credit thus not using it creates a higher score than cancelling it. Thanks Shell/visa/Citibank. The replacement card with a higher limit is from ...Citibank who offered a $250 bribe....err rebate and zero interest on charges for one year to take out the card and charge $2000 on it in three months. $250 is not a typo. I have spent it. Vern

Interesting how things change over time. Back in the "old days" those unused credit balances hurt your credit score because it represented a potential "buying spree" that could send you into bankruptcy. Then, you cancelled old cards to enhance your credit report. Of course, we then reviewed the credit reports by hand and had a feel for the credit worthiness of the individual, too.

I like the you'll be in hot water....I use my spa quite a bit...last night for the full moon I was in it and watching my bonfire!!! Love to watch the stars in it also!!! Kevin ps,its all a game ,,hope you get it!!!!

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It gets pretty hot here in the summer so we'll use it to cool off and hot for sore bodies. Received the new credit card with the $10,000 limit yesterday, one day too late.

I am not sure how it works south of the 49th, but up here the higher your score the better your access to the banking industry's money is. Took us years to build up our credit rating and finally it is where we want it to be. So when it comes to adding to our vehicular fleet - once we find the vehicle we want, the money is there no questions asked and at a really good rate.

Well I am not sure why, but we have been told that if we wanted to go buy a car we could literally put it on our VISA -- Now mind you, at 18% or 19% interest the chance of that happening is not only slim to non-existent, it simply ain't ever gonna happen - even though we pay our card off every 25 days. In all practicality I see no reason why any card should have a limit above $25,000.00 or $30.000.00. That should be enough for anyone one would think. However it is really nice to know that you can have an almost unlimited supply of funds guaranteed by your net worth. Also I checked with our bank and fraud protection is automatic, (works good too - already had experience with that), and we now have a secondary based in US Funds that we use for our on-line presence - has a much smaller limit - I think it is $2,000.00 or $3,000.00 - just to be on the safe side and reduce the amount of exchange charges I pay a month.

Oh yeah, so far the Dodge Grand Caravan, Chrysler Town and Country and the Volkswagen Routan have all failed the test. .. .. more on that later