The Dark Side Of Earning Credit Card Points

amother

Natural

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 1:21 pm

amother wrote:

My husband is a victim of one of them. He did his due research. There is a millionaire who was dealing with this man after having his accountant personally look through all of his books. Don't assume the victims are stupid, naive or looking for a quick buck.

First of all - I’m so sorry.

But That is what I’m saying. If Bernie madoff’s victims could be duped then anyone can be duped.

amother

Natural

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 1:23 pm

FranticFrummie wrote:

I don't know what's worse, people who think they can get easy money for nothing, or the people who set up the scams in the first place.

It's disgusting that frum yidden would get involved in fraud, cheating, lying, taking advantage, and generally breaking the law.

I don’t think anyone intended to do any of that. These aren’t evil people. It was folks neighbors and friends.

It was like people investing in a business using their credit cards.
In many cases the business owners were sure they would pay back.

Amarante

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 1:37 pm

There is a saying that you can't cheat an honest man.

In almost every instance of people getting duped by financial scams, there is am element of getting something for nothing or getting higher returns than are possible.

People talk about Madoff's victims as if they were sophisticated investors but the individual investors knew the returns they were "getting" were too good to be true because they never varied however low the stock market went - that is economically impossible.

The institutional investors were just greedy and also failed to do due diligence - those institutional investors who actually examined the returns did not invest because they realized the returns were impossible.

amother

Aubergine

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 1:58 pm

amother wrote:

I'm really sorry this happened.
But it doesn't matter how much due diligence you do. Who let's someone else use their credit card? And so they can acquire points? I wouldn't lend money unless I was ready for the possibility that I won't get paid back, let alone give access to a credit card.

Amarante

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 2:11 pm

amother wrote:

To a great extent, financial scams perpetrated by individuals operate within insular communities - affinity groups - and rely on unsophisticated people assuming that other members of their insular community can be trusted.

it's not limited to Frum communities - I watch a television program called American Greed (or what my Zeide would have titled American Goniff Very Happy

) and the fraudsters documented have operated in Brooklyn Italian communities; professional athletes; military families; AA and white church members and so on.

amother

Lawngreen

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 2:26 pm

amother wrote:

This is a key point in the article:

"There’s a reason a business is asking you for credit. If a bank won’t give them the credit they need after doing due diligence, then common sense should say that you shouldn’t be either."

There's a reason why they're asking the public for loans. The established financial institution considers them a high risk and won't loan them funds. And raising funds via illegitimate ways places the burden on the lenders if they have to default. They get to walk away with little financial loss while the unassuming public gets whacked over the head with it.

Using money or credit lines in illegitimate ways is generally a way of looking for a quick buck.

amother

Olive

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 3:02 pm

It's very easy to get into a situation like this. If the business owner is your brother and you trust him, it's normal to think it's fine to let him use your credit card. The store that's the focus of this article is run by good people who made bad business decisions that made this whole thing fall apart. The lesson is really that even people you trust can run into hard times and you shouldn't put yourself in the line.

MalkyG

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 3:24 pm

We need to feel bad for people that are victims, not criticize them.
Also, I hate when people say "there's no such thing as easy money" "If it's too good to be true, it probably is". These statements are true most of the time, but there are exceptions.
We all know plenty of people who "do points" and take their families to florida or israel on points every year, so obviously if you know what you're doing you can do very well with these kind of things.

Amarante

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 3:28 pm

MalkyG wrote:

People say these things because they are true - of course, you can win the lottery but the odds always favor the casino. So in general, if something seems financially too good to be true, walk away from it because a fool and his money are soon parted.

People use points by charging their OWN expenses on their credit cards in an amount they can pay back. Smart people don't allow other people to use their credit cards to accumulate points relying on another person to pay off the credit charges. Would you loan a person that amount of money - if not, you shouldn't be letting them use a credit card.

I think of threads like this as PSA's - I followed the original link and skimmed some of the comments. So far as I know dansdeal is not a Frum specific site and yet a disproportionate number of the people who commented and had been burned on these kinds of transactions were obviously Frum Jews.

ETA - When I first posted, I didn't realize dansdeal was a Frum site because I had read about it on the Mr. Moustache website which isn't Frum and no mention was made of that. It's not something that I studied about because the idea of going through complex measures to accumulate points is not something I ever wanted to do - all my credit cards are payable on the same day of the month so I don't have to keep track of separate pay dates - otherwise I would be sure to mess up due dates.

Last edited by Amarante on Wed, Mar 06 2019, 10:34 am; edited 1 time in total

amother

Natural

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 4:05 pm

MalkyG wrote:

In order to take a family to Israel you need a lot of points.

I know a few people who have businesses who make purchases in the millions and cover it quickly. But otherwise it isn’t that easy. (A couple going to Florida is much more doable)

amother

Tan

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 4:15 pm

Amarante wrote:

I think of threads like this as PSA's - I followed the original link and skimmed some of the comments. So far as I know dansdeal is not a Frum specific site and yet a disproportionate number of the people who commented and had been burned on these kinds of transactions were obviously Frum Jews.

Dan's Deals has grown a lot - but curating travel deals of interest to the frum community was a focus at the beginning (flights to NY and TLV...)

Dan is frum.

Amarante

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 4:22 pm

amother wrote:

Dan's Deals has grown a lot - but curating travel deals of interest to the frum community was a focus at the beginning (flights to NY and TLV...)

Dan is frum.

Thank you. I don’t know much about the site but actually had read about it in a non frum context. I think I read about it on the Mr. Moustache site so I didn’t realize it was frum which was why the comments were surprising.

ectomorph

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 4:23 pm

Amarante wrote:

um I agree with your points but Dan is definitely frum and the site is geared to the frum community.plenty of non Jews though

zaq

Tue, Mar 05 2019, 7:08 pm

Scratching my head here. Why on EARTH would anyone let someone else use his or her credit card (barring something like a parent making a child away in school an authorized user in lieu of sending him checks, or assigning someone to shop on one’s behalf)? Why would anyone X believe that a normal person Y would, out of the sheer goodness of Y’s heart, let X collect credit card points for purchases Y made?

Because Y couldn’t get his own credit card? If the bank doesn’t consider X a good risk, why would I?

Last edited by zaq on Tue, Mar 05 2019, 7:33 pm; edited 1 time in total