Debt Exposure
One of the items on my virtual long term to-do list (I'm still thinking about a new way to manage my to-do's — ideally something quick, web-based, and cookie-enabled so I can check and update it quickly) finally got checked off today: Cancelling most of my US credit cards.
I've been at home sick, and this was one of the few activities which could be done while horizontal and required a minimal amount of concentration. I never would have expected that speaking to credit card companies could be an invigorating experience, but the cancellation process seems to be the one exception, especially when every representative's first reaction is immediately to hit that "Transfer to Account Save Team" button, providing me with several minutes worth of compliments and assurances:
"Matt, we see that you've been a card holder in superior standing since 1996." —Thank you.
"We see not a single instance of a late payment or balance limit fee in your history." — Really? Not one on this card? That's pretty cool.
"What if we offered to let you transfer any outstanding balances from other cards at a 3% rate?" —Three percent? That's not too bad, really. But I don't have any balances on my other cards. That's one of the reasons I'm doing this, actually.
"Is there anything at all we could do for you to convince you to stay?" —(This is simply a fun question in general to ponder potential responses to. It was a little fun to hear them squirm when I said, "Start handling Canadian dollar transactions natively? Convince stores here to start accepting your card? Market rates and no fees for currency conversion?" All they could counter with was a gift of $20 into my account balance.)
"Would you be likely to resume your account at a later time, should these conditions change?"
All in all, I had the pleasure of three phone calls in which I felt like the one really cool guy who had deigned to show up at the party hosted by the geeks. I figured any minute they would resort to begging me not to go and would plead with me to stick around to look through their Magic, The Gathering cards.
I've been at home sick, and this was one of the few activities which could be done while horizontal and required a minimal amount of concentration. I never would have expected that speaking to credit card companies could be an invigorating experience, but the cancellation process seems to be the one exception, especially when every representative's first reaction is immediately to hit that "Transfer to Account Save Team" button, providing me with several minutes worth of compliments and assurances:
"Matt, we see that you've been a card holder in superior standing since 1996." —Thank you.
"We see not a single instance of a late payment or balance limit fee in your history." — Really? Not one on this card? That's pretty cool.
"What if we offered to let you transfer any outstanding balances from other cards at a 3% rate?" —Three percent? That's not too bad, really. But I don't have any balances on my other cards. That's one of the reasons I'm doing this, actually.
"Is there anything at all we could do for you to convince you to stay?" —(This is simply a fun question in general to ponder potential responses to. It was a little fun to hear them squirm when I said, "Start handling Canadian dollar transactions natively? Convince stores here to start accepting your card? Market rates and no fees for currency conversion?" All they could counter with was a gift of $20 into my account balance.)
"Would you be likely to resume your account at a later time, should these conditions change?"
All in all, I had the pleasure of three phone calls in which I felt like the one really cool guy who had deigned to show up at the party hosted by the geeks. I figured any minute they would resort to begging me not to go and would plead with me to stick around to look through their Magic, The Gathering cards.