Consumers opt for style over benefits when choosing their cards
What’s factors do you consider when applying for a credit card? You’d expect the most common answers to this question to include interest rates, penalty fees; unique benefits ECT, not specifically in that order, but at least somewhere at the top. Well according to recent studies, almost all of the most likely responses to this question have been pushed to the way side in place of brand and style.
You heard correct! The most important credit card feature, as determined by 80% of those surveyed is the style and brand of their card. However, it is also important to mention that style and brand is very much a starting point for credit card borrowers, and once their ideal provider has been located, actual financial benefits (as mentioned above) will be used in order to whittle down their options to just one card.
There is at least some reassurance in the fact that consumers do not just use image as the ultimate deciding factor, but questions must still be asked in relation to this type of approach as a whole.
Quite obviously, to choose a card based on a “what’s hot and what’s not” mentality is not at all practical. It is suggested that this type of approach is almost certainly one of the reasons why so many Brits come “unstuck” with their finances.
Credit cards are one of the most expensive ways to attain credit and for this reason alone it is absolutely paramount that consumers are more financially savvy when deciding which card is right for them.
In other news, analysts have also warned that dew to a national slump in credit card borrowing, many providers may soon start to reintroduce borrowing fees in order to regulate the shift.
