http://www.moneyweek.com/personal-finan ... 02808.aspx

I knew most of that already, and it doesn't affect me, but FYI...

Thankfully I always pay my card off in full every month.

If you think those intrest rate are high, have you seen the small print on the Quick Quid advert? Something like 2400% (and no, I didn't forget to add a decimal place.)

+1

That's right. Go to work, pay taxes, use your credit card in a "good" way and keep the economy moving.

There's a good citizen.

Wrong.

Many cards charge interest from the day of transaction for any cash advances, these also include (but not limited to) casinos, online betting agencies and some transactions in foreign currencies.

Got a shock when I used one of my old cards for an online bookies and was hit with a £3 charge for the cash advance + interest + foreign exchange rates as it was based in Gibraltar
Never again

But if you use your debit card you get hit for a foreign currency transaction fixed fee, that can be a killer for a low value transaction.

The emphasis was on cash advances, depends on the bank for overseas transactions

More useful with my credit card, is that I don't get charged a fee for using my card abroad.

I have never had a cash advance on my card. Though if they treat online bets as cash advances then I could have, but my Betfair top ups have not been shown as cash advances. Lloyds TSB charge £1.50 per foreign transaction on the debit card.

I used to have a charity credit card (0.5% of all purchases went to the charity), but my bank stopped doing it. So now I have their standard card.

Wow, that's a pretty important fact to check out. I would not have thought twice about using a credit card, especially since casinos sounds potentially dodgy and I'd want the protection.

I don't gamble now out of principle, but I've been considering breeding a poker bot as an interesting project in statistical analysis. The credit card charges could easily have wiped out any winnings since I'd have only been betting the minimum amount and hoping to just break even

I am a member of three casinos but rarely bet. I have come out ahead on the roulette once, about £40. Though the vast majority of time I go for the restaurant.

I don't have a choice, you pay your credit card off 100% every month, that is the law... You can only get a credit card from a bank where you have a current account and it is linked to your current account. The balance is automatically transferred from your current account each month. If you spend too much, your overdraught on the current account has to cover the balance... If your overdraught is exceeded in paying off your credit card, the card and the bank account are frozen, until you clear off the excess.