6826-Article Text-13392-1-10-20210227
6826-Article Text-13392-1-10-20210227
6826-Article Text-13392-1-10-20210227
E, 18 (4) (2021)
Tariq Mahmood, Abdul Quddus Suhaib. An Analytical Study On, Role of Credit
Cards in Present Era of Consumerism & Its Merits and Demerits-- Palarch’s Journal
of Archaeology of Egypt/Egyptology 18(4), 3329-3343. ISSN 1567-214x
ABSTRACT
This paper presents an analysis about the credit cards and consumerism. In this, it is tried that
before the discussion about the credit cards, the historical background and its types are
discussed. In the discussion of credit card types, the difference of developing countries and
developed countries credit cards are analyzed. In this regard, Credit cards of America and
Pakistan are discussed which have wide difference due to their scope and authority as well as
due to interest rate polices. After this, the role of credit cards in the present era of
consumerism is discussed which clarifies that the role of credit cards in the globalized world
has increased than before. No doubt, there are some disadvantages of credit cards but the role
of credit cards is so crucial that convince us to neglect all shortcomings or weak points of
credit cards. So, it can be said that role of credit cards in consumerism is noteworthy. An
Analytical Study on “Role of Credit Cards in Present Era of Consumerism & its Merits and
Demerits”
INTRODUCTION:
It is fact that credit card that was issued by British Petroleum Company and
Donors club for its employees laid the foundations of banking issued credit
cards first. Later on, financial institutions also issued credit cards &debit cards
for its customers and even the charge cards of its non-customers also. In one
side, the burden of work on staff became lesser in financial institutions, on the
other side; getting money from banks became easier. Now customers can get
money through their cards without going concerned bank during banking
hours. Therefore, with the help of credit cards now customers can purchase
and with the help of debit cards, customers can get money anytime, anywhere
for their need. This is why this facility has enhanced the tendency to consumer
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more. Before writing about credit card and its role, it is necessary denotation
and connotation of the word credit might be discussed.
Credit card:
A card entitling one to charge bills at certain places. Now the meanings of
credit are discussed as under:
Credit:
Letter of credit:
Literature Review:
As concerned literature about credit cards, there are many books are available
in hard and soft form. Besides these, there are many research theses and
research articles are written about credit cards. Some of research articles are
presented as under:
Syed Ali Raza, Muhammad Ali & Chin-Hong Puah, wrote article on, “Factors
affecting to select Islamic Credit Cards in Pakistan: The TRA Model,”
published in Journal of Islamic Marketing, 8 (1), in year 2017.
Jawaid Ahmad Qureshi, Sana Baqai& Muhammad Asif Qureshi wrote article
on “Consumers attitudes towards usage of debit & credit cards: Evidence from
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Elif Incerkara Haflir & George Lewentein, “The impact of credit cards on
spending: A field experiment”, SSRN Electronic Journal, published in year
2009.
Celia lie, Maree Hunt & David Harper, “The negative credit card effect: credit
card as spending- limiting stimulus in New Zealand,” The Psychological
Record, Issue 60, published in year 2010.
Importance of Research:
This research work is very useful because it deals with latest important tool of
consumerism, as it provides basic information about credit cards, historical
back ground; typology of credit cards; its uses and abuses in present era.
Discussion& Presentations:
“Credit card is tool for receiving and paying money. This is issued by
commercial bank or financial institutions. This card provides a purchasing
power to its holder. And paying money is the responsibility of its issuer. Card
holder is like borrower while bank is lender. Bank provides assurance to
whom, card holder purchases things. And card holder has authority to gain
special services from this card”. (Muhammad Usama, Maulana, 2005) On the
base of credit, card holder purchases things. On the authority of banks and
credit card companies, transactions are completed without having cash. These
credit cards are of different types and have different level credit value.
Credit cards means cards which allow a customer to make payments on credit.
Supplementary credit cards shall be considered part of the principal borrower
for the purpose of these regulations. Corporate cards will not fall under this
category and shall be regulated by prudential regulations for corporate/
commercial banking or prudential regulations for SMEs (Small Medium
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Enterprises) financing as the case may be. The regulations for credit cards
shall also be applicable on charge cards, debit cards, stored value cards and
B.T.F. (Balance Transfer Facility). (State Bank of Pakistan, 2011) Mostly, the
corporate cards are issued by the banks or financial institutions so these have
different regulations than supplementary credit cards.
Historical Background
In America, in 1914, Inter Union used for the easiness of his staff, in 1924, In
California, General Petroleum Company issued credit cards to the customers
of petrol buying. In 1949, demand of plastic currency increased. Dinners‟ club
issued credit cards for its customers to eat dinner at hotels. In 1951, banks also
issued credit cards after seeing the success of this theory of payment. In very
short period, nearly one hundred banks issued credit cards for use. In 1970, on
the base of “interest of loan”, credit card made progress. So, one committee
for profit was established. Under this, banks made registrations for those who
want to take the facility of credit cards. The name of company was VISA
(Abbreviation) which has branches in 163 countries of the world. (Shahtaz,
Noor Ahmed, Dr.1998) VISA is multinational company which has its
employees all over the world, mostly in developed countries. The employees
of this company have complete record of their card holders to whom, these
cards issued.
Credit has been a defining staple of commerce and transactions since antiquity
and ”buy now, pay later”, schemes date back to Biblical times. Benjamin
Franklin illustrated the paramount significance of credit when he once
remarked,” remember that credit is money,” and President Herbert Hoover
echoed this sentiment when he exclaimed, “let me remind you that credit is the
life, blood of business, prices and jobs. Perhaps, the most significance
development in the history of consumer credit to date was the emergence of
the bank issued credit card. The bank credit card has assumed a substantial
role in contemporary consumer theory and personal finance. (Fine Berg,
Gabriel, 2013) The importance of credit card is imagined that it works the
blood circulates in a body. And stagnation of blood will make the body
motionless. Therefore, in the present era for the business, credit card has
gained importance for businessmen and for the personal transactions also.
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Those credit cards in which limited level of money can be utilized. In these
cards, on the completion of period, then payment of debt is paid e.g. cards of
Islamic banks.
Those credit cards in which card holder has authority to pay debt collectively
or pay it with installments. e.g. VISA card & Master Card. (Muhammad
Usama Maulana, 2005)
These cards are issued without any kind of limitation. These card issuer
companies also provide maximum facilities to its card holders. As concerned,
its shape and size of cards, these have the size like the size of C.N.I.C.
(computerized national identity card) normally. Credit card is made of plastic
or any metal which is kept easily in purse. On this card, card holder‟s name,
date of issue, date of expiry, issuer‟s name, and special number are written.
Bank provides this card to such person who has agreement with bank. In the
world commonly used cards are:
Master card
Euro card
In Pakistan, Master cards, Visa cards, Uni cards, Habib bank cards, City cards,
Dinner‟s club cards, MCB cards are being mostly used since last two decades.
In Pakistan, M.C.B. card is issued by Muslim Commercial bank and Habib
bank Card is issued by Habib Bank. While City card is issued by City Bank.
While Dinner‟s club card, UNI card, VISA card and some others are issued by
foreign financial multinational companies. Generally, two types of credit cards
are as under:
On the base of accounts, there are two more types of credit cards. These are as
under:
Such credit cards which are issued without accounts. (Shahtaz, Noor Ahmed,
1998)
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There are many types of credit cards which are issued on the base of interest.
These are as under:
The main trait of this card is that maximum limit (e.g. ten thousand dollar) of
loan is fixed. No more money is given.
This card is issued on the base of large amount of money in bank account.
This card is not restricted to special conditions. This card has additional
qualities. (Muhammad Usama Maulana, 2005) About these cards, it may be
said that golden card is real credit card which has no limit and no condition for
transaction while silver card is has maximum limit of loan while allasi card is
issued against your amount of bank account.
Anyone, who is willing and able to pay down his former credit card debt
relatively in quick manner, the low rate usually last for only six to nine months
then reverts to something higher, usually around 14 percent to 16 percent.
Rewards card:
People who make the majority of their purchases on credit and pay off the
balance each month, these types of cards have high interest rate and annual
fees.
Secured credit card:
Someone which has gotten into trouble with the credit card in the past, many
secured cards have high interest rate and annual fee.
College students who can handle money responsibility, Students can qualify
for these cards without an established credit rating. Some companies charge
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higher interest rate from students. (Konard Walecia, 2007) All the above four
cards are issued against different level of interest rates which are not suitable
especially for poor man. Anyhow temporarily and for emergency need of cash,
these can be utilized.
According to Schneider Gary,” A charge card is such card that requires the
balance to be paid in full each month”. (Schneider, Gary, 2010) The
methodology of credit card is like charge card but the main difference is that it
is not issued for fixed period. But when credit card holder pays its bill after
fixed quantity of shopping, then it becomes useful for new period.
The bank issued credit cards‟ unique integration and synthesis of interest free
grace period, monthly billing and revolving credit features have also served as
an effective home accounting tool that catalyzed increased spending. Credit
cards helped consumers coordinate the timing of their consumption and
income receipts by lifting the cash flow constraints of periodic pay check. The
genius of the credit card was the ability to purchase goods using money one
did not yet own. (Hamdani, Ijaz Ahmad, Maulana, Dr., 2014) Anyhow, due to
credit card, now business runs on the base of credit rather than lifting larger
bags of cash. Due to credit cards now propensity to consume has increased
than consuming with cash. Therefore, the main differences of credit cards and
charge cards are as under:
By issuing charge card bank demands fee and renew of card is also done with
fee while in issuing credit card, there is no annual fee charged on credit card
and renew is also done without any fee.
In charge card, card holder pays his transaction at the end of every month
while in credit card, banks provide loan to credit card holder. And card holders
have authority to pay or not pay.
In charge card, the last limit is mentioned and card holder has to pay in the end
of the month while there is no condition in credit card and interest is also paid
in fixed period. (Fine Berg Gabriel, 2013) In charge card, credit card holder is
bound to pay within the month. This card is issued against the bank fee.
Charge card is issued to that person who has no money in the bank or
company. Bank pays money to the shopkeepers, and after the end of month,
the bill of total paid money was sent to credit card holder. It is responsibility
of credit card holder that he should pay the bill within the fixed period of
thirty days. Otherwise, if delayed then the interest will be applied on this
amount also, in this card, money and period of periods are fixed. (Muhammad
Usama, Maulana, 2005) In the charge card, card holder is restricted to pay
amount otherwise in case of delaying payment, single interest is applied. After
the delaying to pay amount with single interest, compound interest is applied.
Debit card: This card is issued to that person whose money is deposited in the
issuer bank or institution. And this card is issued within limit of deposited
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amount. So, when card holder signs on the bill then relevant organization
subtracts the amount from the account after receiving the bill. In this situation,
the agreement will be limited because relevant bank or company has borrowed
money from the card holder. (Hamdani, Ijaz Ahmad, Maulana, Dr. 2014)
These cards are confined with the deposited amount. Therefore, amount of bill
is subtracted soon by the issuer concerned bank.
Current account card is a tool of receiving and paying money which is issued
by commercial banks and card holder has authority to purchase from
anywhere against his deposited money of the bank.
Credit card money, interest is also applied while on current account card
interest is not applied.
Payment of borrowed money is done at once on current account card while on
credit card payment is made through installments also.
Current account card is provided (issued) freely to the trader while on credit
card trader has to pay tax.
In issuing credit card, issuer has advantage while in issuing current account
card issuer has no advantage.
Credit cards are the most commonly used form of consumer credit. Almost
two of three families have at least one credit card and almost half of all
families carry a balance. To help the millions of Americans who use credit
cards better understand their agreements C.F.P.B. (Credit Financial Promotion
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The credit card is a double-edged sword. While the benefits of the universal
payment feature and payment functions have been here to fore discussed
extensively, the bank issued credit card also pioneered and popularized an
easy accessible mechanism for borrowing on credit to finance purchases. Prior
to the advent of the credit card, with few exceptions consumers had to render
payment immediately upon purchase. Although in small towns and rural areas
many local merchants operated informal tabs for loyal patrons, the institution
if credit in America until the 1940 was reserved primarily for commercial
enterprises and qualified or highly collateralized individual borrowers. (Fine
berg Gabriel, 2013) This shows that in the advent, use of credit card was very
limited but now the situation has been changed quite different from the past.
Credit cards further undermine our willpower, says Los Angeles clinical
psychologist and wealth consultant James Goth Furcht, before the deregulation
of credit card interest rates in 1978, only wealthier consumers qualified for a
credit card. Now the credit card industry begins soliciting consumers in high
school, offering credit often at very high interest rates without requiring
financial qualification or providing guidance in how the cards should be used:
(Novontney Amy, 2008) This is clear that credit card issuer companies and
banks have advantage of interest rate income behind these credit cards.
Therefore, these organizations are issuing credit cards at school level
consumers.
Most Americans have unclaimed monthly cash flow that they are currently
paying to credit card companies that can be reduced simply by asking often
via a simple telephone call to their creditors if they know the rights words to
use when they get on the telephone. There are simple action steps you can take
today to both improve your credit rating and reduce the often exorbitant (very
high) interest rates and fees you are currently paying on credit cards. You are
about to unlearn thinking poorly about how you manage consumer debt and
begin learning and acting the way the wealthy do. You can manage your debt
burden downward and increase your abundance. (John Hyland, 2014) This is
true that to increase the debt or decrease the debt, it depends upon card holder
that in what way he uses credit.
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society that works like as the „Linchpin „works in a vehicle. Without this part,
vehicle cannot run on the road.
The credit card served as an innovative vehicle for mass consumer credit that
combined two essential credit features: it was an unsecured line of credit is a
non-collateralized or non-asset backed agreement in which the borrower can
draw up to a predetermined credit limits at any time and pays interest only on
money actually withdrawn. A line of credit facilitates borrowing and therefore,
spending as well because the borrower needn‟t approach the bank (lender)
each time he needs money. The second and perhaps more radical breakthrough
of bank issued credit card was the nature of the unsecured credit line revolving
credit functionally. Until the emergence of Bank American card in 1958,
institutions that provided consumer credit such as hotels and restaurants
offered only installment credit. (Fine Berg Gabriel, 2013)
After this bank card issuance, many large hotels also provided this facility to
its customers. In this way, now they can pay the payments in installments also.
The paying in installments was easy than paying in whole amount. Besides the
America and United Kingdom, these cards also being used by some other
countries also.
The Chinese economy, the 2nd largest in the world after United States, is
undergoing massive transformation. The country has consistently set
impressive growth rates close to 8% for nearly two decade years. Even though
suffering from economic crisis china‟s growth rate is still remained at 10.3%
in the second quarter of 20‟s century. (Tang Lei, 2010) This clearly shows that
China has gained two percent more than its projected growth rate of the
economy. This is more notable, that this was done even in the crisis situation.
As concerned the connection with credit card holders and creditors, different
companies have different ways and different techniques about connecting and
acquiring their credit.
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The communication with the credit card companies is done through the
acquires, so there is no direct communication with card companies should
provide the same functionally as the acquirer, and must have a connection
with all issuers. (Geertz Etienne, 2015) But it is considered better for the
issuing company that he should have connection with the card holder also
rather than only creditor.
In one survey, when students were asked about credit card interest rate. More
than 70% respond that they did not know about interest ratio or they did not
know surely about interest rate. While during the study, it was noticed that
more than 50% college students had credit card huge balances. (A‟ Nick
Heather, 1997) This clearly shows that half numbers of credit card holder have
large amount of balances while third portion of card holder from the fourth
have no knowledge about the interest rate. From the results, it is clearly
imagined that college students had no sure knowledge about credit card
interest rate because this was paid by their parents so these students had no
interest about credit card interest.
Many credit card advantages have been identified in the literature. First
consumes gain time to pay, which results in a monetary advantage because the
value a dollar today is not the same as the value of a dollar tomorrow. When
consumers make cash payment funds are disbursed immediately but when they
use credit card funds are not disbursed immediately. Instead, funds are
disbursed only when the credit card company pays bills of consumers for the
charger. (Emmanuel Andoh, 2014) This shows that actual payment is made
after the credit shopping. This is suitable in such condition if the prices of
goods increase, while if the prices of goods decreased in coming days this
shopping will be feel loss for credit card buyer.
Merits /advantages:
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Card holder can take any foreign currency with the help of this card.
With the credit card there is no need to check & balance to card holder.
Some banks provide facility to card holder that they can get money from other
bank.
Sometimes card holder gets things cheap than the market price when such
trader has agreement with issuer bank.
Some credit cards provide life insurance also e.g. golden credit card.
Some issuer companies give prizes to card holders through lotteries and draws.
In case of loss of credit card only nominal fee is charged on the issuance of
duplicated credit card after the information of lost providing. (Shahtaz, Noor
Ahmad, Dr., 1998)
Quickest loan.
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On base of fake demand, increased buying has clear disadvantages, when card
holder has no money in his account.
In the un-payment situation user has to bear interest which increases (day by
day) with the passage of time.
By buying card (credit) heavy fees (dues) are paid and sometime this is not.
Credit card fraud has become a major issue for financial institutions. In 2006
the credit card fraud was 428 million pounds for the U.K. only. To reduce
credit card fraud, a new worldwide standard has been introduced called EMV
(Euro pay Master Card visa). These are the manes of three of main credit card
companies in the world today. (Geertz Etienne, 2015) Anyhow, Through
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E.M.V. it is tried to eliminate the credit card fraud. It is hoped that this E.M.V.
standard will decrease the credit card frauds.
CONCLUDING REMARKS:
In the sum, it may be stated that besides some disadvantages of credit cards, its
advantages of credits are also numerous. This is fact that credit card has
become the part and parcel in the present era. Now the use of credit card is not
confined to developed countries but in developing countries its use is
becoming very popular like Pakistan. It is fact that these cards are still used in
larger cities of developing countries by mostly the wealthy persons. But, its
familiarity and vastness predicts that in future, these credit transactions will be
increased also in developing countries. Now, sometimes by hacker‟s credit is
being hacked that create problem for credit card holders. This is why, the
solution of these types of hacking of data or account information or money
transfer must be search out for the safety of credit card holders and for the
security of data and soft money. Otherwise credit and durability of credit cards
will be declined.
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