In these troubling economic times, please take a moment to think about those poor credit card companies...
Monday, May 25, 2009 at 11:27AM 
So I had to go to the neighborhood hardward store this weekend to get an extension cord, and ended up getting an earful of stupidity.
When I walked up to the cash register to pay, there was a middle aged lady chatting it up with the sales guy. She was off to the side and clearly wasn't buying anything, so I stepped up to the counter to pay. Also, and this is not entirely relevant to the story except perhaps for character development, she was holding 2 large stuffed animals (one Elmo, one cat) in kind of a choke-hold/hug for no apparent reason. She must have brought them with her, since I didn't see any stuffed animals for sale in the store.
Anyway, I tend to rarely carry much cash on me, preferring to use my debit card as credit for even the smallest of purchases. Still, sometimes this pisses off vendors, so when I went to pay for the $6 cord I said, "is it okay to use credit for such a small amount?" The guys said no problem, but the Elmo lady took it upon herself to weigh in:
"You'd better use them quick - before Obama shuts down all the credit card companies!"
Wait, what?!
She went on, "You know... there are plenty of people out there that need credit cards every day just to pay their bills, and I'm one of 'em!"
My mind was so busy trying to wrap my head around exactly what she was saying, that I didn't manage to actually get any words out. Instead, I suspect the look of my face effectively communicated that I was not exaclty in agreement with her sentiments, and the conversation ended there. The sales guy just stayed out of it.
The more I think about this, the more fumed I get. I mean, really, right now with everything going on in this economic mess, there are people worried about the freakin credit card companies going out of business? First of all, that's just not going to happen. Secondly, does she understand how credit cards work? That they are not just magical free money that should be used to pay bills on a regular basis and never have to be paid back?
And I'm assuming she's pulling Obama into this because of this new bill he introduced that is designed to stop credit card companies from jacking up fees and interest rates on their customers without any notice. I'm sorry, but why is that a bad thing? Even most Repulicans are supporting it, because those sort of practices have caused millions of people to get even further into debt.
C'mon Elmo lady, wise up.
Reader Comments (3)
Jorli,
This is funny and sad at the same time. Those poor credit card companies have been charging outrageous fees and ripping off consumers! This reminds me of the same people who thought Obama was a Muslim.
To read more of my thoughts, here's my post: http://therecessionista.blogspot.com/2009/05/credit-crunch-watch-those-charges-at.html
Pathetic. Sounds like a very uniformed individual you were dealing with.
On the topic of credit cards.... I had my own fun experience w/my Amex Blue this weekend. I recently had the exciting experience of paying off all my credit cards (yippeee!). So, I know credit limit was not an issue... I went to Bloomie's to buy my DH an anniversary present... gave them my card & no problem. Sale complete. Went up to the women's section to see if I could find some sort of clothing that wouldn't make me look like a pregnant version of Laura Engalls-Wilder (what's with all the stupid frilly maternity clothing???). When I went to pay for the dress I found with the very same card.. I got told the charge wouldn't go thru for some security reason... Luckily, the sales woman didn't snatch the card from my grasp & commence to cut it up... However, I was very red faced & embarrassed about the whole thing. WTF?? Needless to say, after calling Amex & speaking to Apu in Bangalore about my suspicious sale at "Macy's" (Apparently they think it's all the same store....) I was able to convince him to remove the security lock on my card. Talk about pissing off a good customer!! Sheesh!
Maybe she thought elmo *was* Obama . . . hence the chokehold