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Comment by elmer2 | Hacker News Reader

I used to have this same mentality (no credit cards) when I was younger, until my debit card was stolen and someone took $1000. The bank basically shrugged their shoulders and said there was nothing they could do.

I always get my money back when this happens with a credit card purchase. I've also had to dispute things occasionally, and I almost always get refunded.

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In an alternative universe, the government could require banks to refund victims of theft and fraud. It's entirely possible for banks to do this without requiring you use a credit card, they just don't want to.

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-...

> Industry body, UK Finance, estimates that criminals successfully stole £1.28 billion through banking fraud and scams in 2025. Of this, £703 million was unauthorised and £576 million was authorised.

> Unauthorised fraud is where the fraudulent transaction is carried out by a third party, not the victim. Authorised fraud involves the victim being tricked into paying money into another account that is controlled by a criminal. This is also known as Authorised Push Payment (APP) fraud.

https://www.psr.org.uk/news-and-updates/latest-news/news/pay...

> Frontier found that APP fraud losses have fallen by an estimated £73 million per year and the number of APP scams have fallen by nearly 35,000 due to the policy. Reimbursement rates for all claims have risen from 54% to 65%, and for claims in-scope of the policy, firms are now reimbursing 97%.

The origin of these protections in the US date back to the early decade of the general purpose credit cards. They started out for business expenses (the first one was branded “Diner’s Club”), but they were so profitable that the issuers wanted to branch out to consumers, but those were wary: many already had credit with their local merchants and didn’t see the point. (The local merchants offered credit bc women couldn’t have bank accounts).

Anyway, the credit card companies (Diner’s Club and Bank Americard, now Visa but still retaining the original color scheme and logo) lobbied Congress in the late 60s to get these protections enshrined in law so that consumers would get a benefit over using cash as a positive incentive to switch.

Yea, we never, ever use debit cards. Credit cards only, for the heightened consumer protections. It sucks that most banks and credit unions give you one by default that doubles as an ATM card. I always push back and ask if they offer an ATM card that does NOT have debit capability.

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