A Debt card & Cashback

Living in the United States requires us high credit score to reduce all costs or get the loans easily. As a foreigner, it is not that easy to get the credit high because we've never piled up our financial transactions or business in the United States. As a matter of fact, all Banks do not issue the credit card to us when we first get to the United States. Instead, we could have the debit card, which provides an alternative payment method to cash when making purchases.

The debit card is physically like a credit card, yet its functionality is more similar to writing a check as the funds are withdrawn directly from the cardholder's bank account. Some debit cards are referred to as check card.

However, at first, I mistook this debit card for the credit card because the casher always asked me to decide between a credit and debit purchase. Before my card is swiped through a card reader, the merchant wants to know what type of payment I choose. Therefore, my card, I thought, is both a credit and a debit card. In a credit purchase, I sign a charge slip ; in debit purchase, I enter a PIN, 4 digits, after the merchant usually enters the amount of the transcation. Of course, my account should be debited when I purchase someting with a card either in a credit or a debit option.

In the United States, merchants also offer "cashback" service to customers, where a customer can withdraw cash along with their purchase.

Then, what is "cashback" facility? A big company in Korea has extensively advertised their "cashback" service, where the customer can get discounted price or some benefit in their transactions if they bring the coupons to the supermarkets. But this "cashback"benefit is different. This has nothing to do with coupons. In a shopping mall, after entering my PIN and confirm my transaction, a question popped up the screen of a card reader. "Do you want CASHBACK?" If I press "yes" and "the amount of money", the casher gives me that money I want to draw out along with the receipt of my transaction, which "cashback" is also added to sum. This is free of charge (commission). This money, no wonder, comes from my account. I do not need to visit the bank or ATM machine to withdraw money. So convenient.

It takes usually 5-7 business days to get the card from the bank after applying. However, there is one thing you have to pay attention. Though you get the card, that card is still useless until you activate it. In fact, we do not go through "the activation process" with the card in Korea.

Yet, here, in the United States, you have to call or visit the bank to activate your card before using. This is dissimilar to us.