The funny thing about bad credit is that it’s a slippery slope: the more trouble you get into, the more expensive everything gets, and the harder it is to manage it all. One of the ways the credit industry balances itself out is by charging higher fees and interest rates to people with lower credit scores.

So what do you do when you’re on the bottom looking up? When we hit bottom I knew that we had to do something to re-establish our credit rating. We were driving a car that was falling apart, renting our home, and had no real assets to speak of. So how did we come back from the abyss?

First, I sat down and took a long hard look at my finances. Then, I choked and accepted one simple truth: It was going to be expensive to raise my credit score back up. That’s where the finances vs. credit battle began.

The only way to raise your credit score is by getting and using credit properly. The only companies that were willing to lend me money all wanted to charge upwards of $250 worth of fees just to give me the privilege of paying better than 19% interest. So, I plucked up my courage and launched a multi-part attack on my bad credit score.

1) I invested a small amount of money into an Orchard Bank secured credit card. I started with $200. They paid a pitiful rate of interest (.02% If I remember correctly) on my savings account. But they did report monthly to all three credit bureaus. The other main benefit to getting that card was that I could simply make an extra deposit into savings any time I wanted, and it would raise my credit score. The icing on the cake was a very reasonable 9% interest rate.
When you have bad credit, an interest rate that low is unheard of.

2) I went ahead and applied for a high fee-unsecured credit card. I chose the Rewards 660 Visa largely because they report to the credit bureaus and they automatically raise your credit limit $75 each time you make three on time payments in a row and don’t go over the limit. The problem is, they had $250 worth of initial fees, and then an annual fee well over $100. As well as a 19% interest rate. I no longer carry a revolving balance on either of my cards though, so I was not really as worried about that.

3) I started monitoring my credit scores, and my credit reports. This cost an average of $30 a month.

4) I challenged incorrect items on my credit report. That was free and it did raise my score.

5) I sent $100 a month extra to my secured credit card to raise my limit. I did it for 5 months in a row.

6) I paid off my credit cards every month, on time, without fail.

So, all in all I figure raising my credit score from the mid 500’s into the high 600’s cost me around $1200 when I counted all the card fees and the credit monitoring service.

At first glance, that appears to be a terrible financial decision, I know. But the truth is, raising my score more than 100 points was worth every penny. And, as long as I keep managing my credit well, that improved credit score will continue to save me thousands of dollars on our home (by being able to periodically refinance), on our next car if we have to finance it, and on every better credit offer that comes along.

In other words, it was a temporary financial sacrifice for my greater financial good. And the most valuable thing I took away from the whole experiences was that I really and truly learned the ins and outs of my credit score and reports. I learned to manage my money. However much that lesson cost me, the rest of my life will be better because of it.

What do you think? If you were in my position would you be willing to pay all of these fees just to raise your credit score? Would you forgo repairing your credit altogether? Would you have explored other options and tried different methods of raising your score? Leave me a comment below, I’d love to have your opinions!

One of the reasons why I love my American Express credit cards is the customer service that you get that nobody really tells you about. Here are 2 contrasting stories with 2 cards I have, the Blue Cash card and the Chase Flexible Rewards Card.

About a months and a half ago (as far as I can remember), I brought our family to the Ben Franklin Institute. There was a special display for Star Wars items. I am a huge Star Wars fan and my kids have also been introduced to Star Wars. So what a better way to start our weekend with a morning journey to the Museum.

I managed to find a parking space about a block away from the museum. There was no parking attendant. Rather, there was a credit card machine for us to pay. So out came my Blue Cash card and the parking amount turned out to be $15.00 (a fixed charge). However, when everything was processed, I pushed the “receipt button” but could not find the receipt. Hence, I inserted my credit card again and went through the whole process. Then I found the slot where the receipt was supposed to be and found 2 receipts. Oops! Looks like I may have paid twice.

While walking to the museum, I gave Amex a call. The customer service representative told me that the charges are not in the system yet and it will take 2 or 3 days before they could do anything. So I was asked to call back on Monday.

On Monday, I called Amex and they asked me to raise dispute over a charge (although this was more of an accident on my part than a dispute). Amex told me to chill out and that everything will be sorted out.

Statement on next bill

To my surprise, on my next statements, they had a section that said :

Pending Investigation - No payment on the disputed amount of $15.00 is required at this time

Letters from American Express

I also got a letter from Amex on 4th March 2008 which read :

Dear Mr Credit Card

Customer Service Supervisor
Dispute Reference Number : xxxxxxx

Matter Resolved

Then on 2nd April, we got another letter from American Express.

Dear Mr Credit Card

Customer Service Supervisor
Dispute Reference Number : xxxxxx

What’s the big deal you might ask?

Well, we have another pending investigation : this time with Chase. Mrs Credit Card signed the kids up for spring baseball. But the kids did not want to play. But Mrs Credit Card had already paid online via our Chase credit card.

Mrs Credit Card called the “little league organizer” to get a refund. They agreed to our request but said they would charge us a $10.00 administration fee. This happened on 13th of March. Mrs Credit Card was expecting a credit on our next Chase statement. However, there was none.

So she called up Chase and raised a dispute (on 7th April). However, Chase told her that we have to give the vendors 30 days to act. Hence, they told us to call back on the 13th (exactly, one month from the call we made to the “little league organizer”. It turned out that the charges were not reversed.

So chase said that they will send us a form to fill and to send in all relevant supporting evidence. What a contrast this is to my Amex Experience! I shall stop now and reserve the outcome for another post.

But this is another episode that reinforces my positive feelings for American Express Credit Cards. I really think they have the best customer service compared to other credit card issuers.

For years, Mrs Credit Card and myself used a small digital camera that was kind of “pocket size”. It was digital, but frankly speaking, I preferred the old analog cameras. For one, it took better pictures and there was any shutter delays. Most of the “less expensive” (up to $400) digital cameras had such slow shutter speeds that we could never use them for our kids soccer games. Mrs Credit Card gets so pissed when we are taking family photos because the kids will simply not keep still for even a few seconds.

So, finally, I decided to get a proper Digital SLR Camera. What really ticks me off is that an old style analog SLR probably cost about only $150! Yet, for a decent digital camera (which means SLR) that has quick shutter speeds, we probably had to spend at least $600.

Membership Rewards Digital SLR Choice

The first place where I turned to was the Membership Rewards catalog and website since I have both the Platinum Card. They had 68 digital camera offerings and lots of digital SLR cameras. The only issue I have with them is that they do not list all their exact models. To give them credit, they do list all the relevant features. Below are the list of digital SLR cameras available from Membership Rewards.

Sony Cybershot Still Camera 8.1MP, Karl Zeiss 15X Optical Zoom Lens and 2GB Memory Stick - 73,000 Pts	Canon 8.0 MP Digital Camera with 12X Zoon Optical Lens with 2GB SD Memory Card - 74,000 Pts	Canon 12.1 MP Digital Camera with 6X Zoon Optical Lens with 2GB SD Memory Card - 77,900 Pts
Nikon Digital SLR Camera with zoom Nikkor 18-55mm lens and 1GB Memory Stick - 95,000 Pts	Sony Cybershot 8.1MP with Karl Zeiss 15X Optical Zoom Lens and 2GB Memory Stick - 85,500 Pts	Nikon 10.2 Digital SLR Camera with zoom Nikkor 18-55mm lens and 1GB Memory Stick - 120,000 Pts
Sony Digital Single Lens Reflex Camera Kit - 139,000 Pts	Pentex K10D Digital SLR with Lens Kit - 145,000 Pts	Sony Digital Single Lens Reflex Camera with 2GB memory stick pro duo media - 189,000 Pts
Canon 8.2MP Digital SLR with EF-S 18-55mm Lens and 2GB Professional series compactflash card - 225,000 Pts	Sony Digital 12.2MP Single Lens Reflex Camera with Sal 1870 zoom lens - 247,000 Pts	Canon 10.1MP Digital SLR camera with 4GB CF memory card - 248,800 Pts
Sony Digital 12.2MP Single Lens Reflex Camera with 16-105mm kit - 315,000 Pts	Canon Digital 12.8MP SLR Camera with 2GB high speed CF memory card - 247,000 Pts

Citi ThankYou Network

Though I did not have enough Citi ThankYou points, I still decided to check out their offerings. In total, the ThankYou Network has 18 digital camera offerings. Unlike the Membership Rewards program, ThankYou actually gives you the exact camera model. The three digital SLRs that they had were :

Canon EOS Rebel XT 8.0MP Digital SLR Kit - 113,100 Pts	Canon EOS Rebel XTi 10.2MP Digital SLR Kit - 117,500 Pts	Nikon D80 10.2MP Digital SLR Kit - 167,300 Pts

Bank of America

I next searched the Bank of America Worldpoints website. Under the merchandise section, Worldpoints had a total of 22 cameras, of which I could find 3 digital SLR cameras (listed below).

Canon Powershot S5 IS Digital Camera - 79,600 Pts	Olympus Evolt E-410 Digital Camera - 117,000 Pts	Canon EOS Rebel XT Camera - 129,000 Points

What did I buy and where did I buy it?

After much research, I decided to head to Best Buy and actually touch and feel the cameras. I ended buying from Best Buy because I really wanted the camera in a hurry! I got the Canon EOS Rebel XT with 6.0 MP (which is not available from any of the catalogs!).

Which catalog has the best digital SLR camera offerings?

In my opinion, the American Express membership rewards program has the most selection of merchandises and in the camera section, it simply blew away other reward programs in terms of sheer number of offerings. It also had more high end offerings than both the worldpoints and thankyou network programs. If you are looking for a reward card, then I would definitely suggest getting an American Express reward card.

I will be going to Atlanta at the end of May over the weekend with my friend Jim for a seminar. It also occurred to me that my American Express Platinum Credit Card has a domestic airline companion ticket program that allowed me to get one free ticket. So I decided to see this works. This is my little story two days ago on how I saved money on two airline tickets :

I checked for flight availability from Philadelphia to Atlanta and it turns out that US Airways was the best choice. I then keyed in my preferred itinery into US Airways’ website and the total cost came up to $292, with taxes, it was about $312.18 (if I recall correctly).

So I called American Express Platinum’s 1-800 number. I selected travel and then chose the Domestic Companion flight menu and was taken to a travel agent. The company that runs this program for Amex is API (can’t remember what it stands for).

I was told that the minimum cost of an airline ticket (without the taxes) is $299. Hence for the flight that I wanted, I still had to pay $299 even though it was quoted at $292. But there were other taxes and fees as well. Here is the breakdown :

$41.18 - tax per ticket (multiplied by two since I was getting a companion ticket)
$15.00 - ticketing cost per ticket (ditto)
$411.36 - total cost

Being who I am and that fact that I wanted to blog about this experience, I asked the agent what the $41.18 tax consist of. This was the breakdown he read from his cheat sheet :

$20.38 - US Airways Tax - (huh! kinda like the ‘bogus tax’ that cell phone operators charge?)
$6.80 - airport tax
$5.00 - fuel tax
$9.00 - federal tax

If I had bought two seperate tickets, it would have cost $624.36. Hence, both Jim and myself saved $106.50 each. Had Mrs Credit Card been my companion, we would have saved $213.00. Given that the annual fee of the card is $395, I guess that a couple more free companion flights would cover the annual cost (By the way, you can use the companion ticket feature four times in one calendar year).

This was a very pleasant experience for me. I must say this feature is impressive because I can choose my own flights, unlike some other reward programs that only give you the flights if they have not sold out their ‘allocation’! I will using definitely be using this feature again later this year. It really looks like the $395 annual fee will be covered by my next trip with Mrs Credit Card.

When the Home Depot was closing down to make way for a Walmart in King of Prussia, they started having sale to get rid of inventory. It started off with 10% to 30% off and 2 weeks later - it’s now 20 to 40% off.

During the first week of the sale. I would drive by and remind myself to do a list before I go in. My lists included a window screen, several light bulbs, mulch, air filters, carbon dioxide detectors, rugs, garden hose, flash lights & a toilet seat. (Yes, mine needed to be replaced !)

I persuaded my neighbor - who is a contractor to come along. He has the Chase Home Improvement Rewards^SM Card which he used for my purchases as he would earn 3 rewards for every dollar he spent at Home Improvement Stores. Needless to say, he also loaded up.

When we finally went last Friday, we saw so many guys with big trucks loading up their merchandise. Somehow I was getting excited and thought maybe I’ll get a good bargain for a grill. (Although it’s not on my list) It’s so hard to focus when you know everything is discounted. You want to buy almost everything because you tell yourself that you’ll need it someday. So, I walked around for 2 and a half hours and only succeeded in getting light bulbs, mulch, garden hose, a rug, 3 flash lights and yes, my beloved toilet seat. No, the grill is still out of reach - maybe it would be further reduced in another week of two. It’s such a big place and if you are not a frequent shopper in Home Depot, you spent half the time searching for the right ailse. Frankly, it’s not my favorite shopping destination.

As much as we made some savings with purchases that we eventually needed to make, going to close out sales can tempt you to buy more than you planned, and often on unnecessary stuff. If I had done it again, I would have wrote down a list of things I needed to buy rather than walk around for two hours looking at every discount!

In New York last week, we went to the M&M store at 48th at Broadway. To say that is was fascinating was an understatement. Here was a chocolate manufacturer with a store that sells T-shirts, M&M products like pillows!, and off course loads of M&M chocolates.

What caught my eye though was the presense of a NASCAR Model in the store on the second floor. I then realized that M&M was the sponsor for NASCAR.

I got all excited as this is probably as close as I’ll ever get to an actual NASCAR race car!

Last week, I while checking my online statements and my Amex Platinum Card bill, I realize that I had not sent any online payments to my Blue Cash account.

I quickly looked through my files but could find the March bill. I called Blue Cash immediately (this was late at night) and spoke to a customer service rep. This was how the conversation went.

Mr Credit Card : Hi - this is Mr Credit Card (my real name off course). I was just checking my Amex Platinum Card bill and my online banking account and realize that I have not got my March Bill for my Blue Cash card and I may have missed paying my bill. Can you please check.

Customer Rep : Let me check sir. (After about 20 seconds) Sir, you have not paid your March bill, which is $1066.

Mr Credit Card : I did not get my March bill in the mail and I did not mean to be late on the bill. I will pay the bill right this moment from my online banking account. Could you please waive the late charges and any finance fees?

Customer Rep : Let me see here. Yes, you have a finance charge of $22.16 (or something like that) and a late fee of $35. I’ll waive it for you. Just give me a second. (After a few seconds) Alright Mr Credit Card, I have waived both the late fees and the finance charges. You have been a very good customer and your payment record is great. That will not be a problem.

Mr Credit Card : Thank you very much. Can you please send me a copy of my March Statements just for my records. And also, is this late payment reported to the credit bureaus?

Customer Rep : Sure, I will send you a copy of your March statement. No, we do not report to the credit bureaus unless you are overdue by 60 to 90 days.

Mr Credit Card : Thanks once again.

Customer Rep : (Doing the upsell) Mr Credit Card, before you go, I just wanted to let you know that we have a new offer that allows you to get a $500,000 (or something like that) travel insurance when you use your Blue Cash card to buy any airline ticket. Would you be interested?

Mr Credit Card : No thank you. I use my Platinum Card for travel. Bye, and have a good day.

Phew! Simple as that. Just ask Amex to remove your finance charges and late fees and it was done. Nice friendly customer rep as well (not the Indian reps you get on some night calls from other credit cards). I guess I get away with this because I have been an American Express cardholder since 1994. I have mostly paid in full on my Gold Card and Blue Cash Card. If you a record of late payments, you may not get away with it. But you can see why I am such a fan of American Express.

Yes, Mrs Credit Card and myself have just celebrated our 10th Wedding Anniversary last week. Looking back, I just want to share some financial lessons I have learnt during the last 10 years.

1. Save the bulk of your year end bonus

We have always saved the bulk of our year end bonuses we get from our jobs. This has allowed us to set aside a sizable chuck of savings. This has come in very handy many times during the last 10 years (when we needed to dip into some savings).

2. Buy things that last (not just cheap stuff)

When we just got married, we often had to watch what we spent. Afterall, we had just started our carriers. But there were several times that we probably spent more on goods that we should have, but those lasted a long time. For example, I spent a few hundred dollars on some nice shoes that lasted about 8 years. I bought a couple of designer suits that I still wear today! (and they still look very good). Mrs Credit Card still has business dresses that she bought 10 years ago. I believe they are still in this condition because they are of good quality and they do last (though they cost more).

3. Second Hand Cars really saves you a lot of money

We have had a few cars. All were second hand except one. And we wished we had not bought that new car (because of depreciation). All the second hand cars we bought never gave us any serious problems. We still own a second hand car today.

4. Never assume your kids would like what you bought

Mrs Credit Card toyed about buying a nice big doll house for our daughter. She assumed that she would fall in love with it and spend a lot of time with it. When we finally got it last Christmas, our daughter hardly looked at it! She spends more time drawing with her brothers, playing legos or Thomas the Tank Engine! Just goes to show you should never assume your kids would like what you bought for them.

5. Never assume your kid will like what you want them to do

Mrs Credit Card got my first son to learn to play the voilin when he was four. He was actually pretty good at it and we were all happy about it. Then, due to us moving, relocating, we stopped his voilin lessons and he has since refused to continue learning voilin. My son now likes soccer, baseball and playing chess. He says he does not like football or basketball. Come to think of it, we spent quite a bit of money on his voilin lessons (including buying the voilin and replacing the strings a couple of times). Not to mention the stress of asking him to practice daily! Don’t force something on your kids. They may not only be unhappy, but you end up wasting both time and money!

6. Teach your kids about Money

One thing I have learnt is that you have to teach your kids the value of money. Most people do not learn money management skills from their parents and hence, most are poor at that. I talked to many enterpreneurs and they all teach their kids about business and money and I have started that with our kids. I think we still have a great deal of room to improve, but at least we think about it.

7. Hire a financial advisor early

When you are young and educated, you think you know it all. I started investing myself in both stocks and mutual funds very early on. I really thought I knew it all. Most of you do (especially pf bloggers). But do you know your risk tolerance. Well, I thought I did until the daily volatility of my yahoo, amazon.com and ebay stocks was more than my annual salary!. I’ve made out ok over the years but when I looked back, I could have made much more by truly having a diversified portfolio.

But even here, most people do not understand what a truly diversified portfolio means. Do you know what percentage of the US equity markets consists of large cap, mid cap and small cap stocks? Do you know what percentage of US equities make up the World Equity Indices? What percentage of total Global Capital Markets is fixed income and what percentage is equities? How do you mix in index funds with with superior fund managers? Do you understand what Alpha and Sharpe Ratio is?

Truth is most people (including dare I say pf bloggers, investing bloggers, magazine writers, finance web site writers) do not know that answers to these question. And if you do not know the answers, how can you have a truly diversified portfolio and understand why it is constructed that way.

8. Take your time to buy your first home

Although most financial advisors and the mainstream press would have you believe that you should buy your first home as soon as you can afford a downpayment, I think you should think about this issue very carefully. Firstly, you should have a stable job. If you work in a very unstable industry, you probably have to save more to have a “cushion”. Buy only what you can afford. This sounds common sensical but with the real estate shooting through the roof in the last few years, you can get caught up easily and buy something that you really cannot afford (or one that leaves you no margin for error).

By the way, we bought our first house at a foreclosure auction. This probably saved us close to $50,000. (not bad at all).

9. Time is Money

Sometimes, in a bid to be more frugal, we tend to save money but waste a lot of time. When we were first married, Mrs Credit Card wanted to do the laundry herself (and save the money we would have spent at the laundromat). But this was taking up too much time on Saturdays! And she always accused me of not helping (well, I hate doing laundry). I finally convinced her to send the clothes to the laundry so we do not waste our precious Saturdays arguing over it. She finally agreed and was happy with the decision.

Remember, while you may want to save money, consider how much your time is worth as well.

10. Delayed Gratification

Delayed gratification is one of the most important trait to have for success. We all have our dreams, our dream car, dream house, dream BBQ grill etc. But financially successful people always put off spending on discretionary items until they can easily afford it. Both of us put off buying our house for years until we have really saved enough. We listened to music on my old Dell Laptop for years before buying a Hi-Fi system. We had a 19 inch TV for ages before buying a Home Theater. It is easy to fall into the 0% financing that is so common and is advertized to us everyday. But most people I know got into trouble because they buy stuff before they can afford it.

We are trying to teach our kids about this too. So far, we think we are on the right track. When we go to Toys R Us, our kids know that we will not be buying anything for them (unless it is their birthday or Christmas). They know that they are only there to ‘look at stuff’. We allow them to use their savings and pocket money to buy things. But when they realize that they will be using their own money, they stop thinking about buying stuff!

11. Use Reward or Cash Back Credit Cards to Earn Freebies

Both Mrs Credit Card and myself pay our credit bills in full (most of the time anyway). We use our cards to pay for everything, pay in full, and earn either reward points or cash rebates. Our two main cards are the American Express® Preferred Rewards Gold Card (although I have now upgraded to the Platinum Card) and the Blue Cash® from American Express . We have got lots of free airline tickets and cash rebates over the years.

12. Develop Money Trust Between One Another

Since we first dated, we have never had an argument over money. We never blew our money on stuff we cannot afford, nor have we really questioned each other’s expenses. If Mrs Credit Card saw a nice handbag and wants to buy it, I never question that decision. She has never abused that trust by being a shopperholic and buying a handbag every month! The same goes for me. This makes it so much easier. We had our fights in many other areas, but thankfully, money was never one of them. It’s tough enough to argue about relationships, kids, work etc. The last thing you really need is to argue about money with your partner.

So that’s it - my lessons from 10 years of marriage.

Last Saturday when we were in New York City, we had lunch at Funky Diner at 466 Columbus Ave (around 81st street I believe). The idea was to have lunch there before heading off to the American Museum of Natural History.

Funky Diner had some very interesting dishes. My kids ordered a kid’s cheeseburger meal, a bacon omelette, and a bowl of warm oats with walnuts. I had a salad which came in a nice looking bowl.

(Top Left) - Salad with a dash of Advocado, (Top Right) - Bacon Omelette, (Bottom Left) - Oates with Walnuts, (Bottom Right) - Cutely decorated mini kids cheeseburger



Mrs Credit Card and myself shared the salad. As she was three quarter way through, she chewed on something that was not chewable. Turns out that there was some plastic stuff in the salad!

We immediately called the waitress and told her about the incident. She was polite and immediately apologized. When we got the check, there was no charge for the salad. The total bill came up to $22.22.

Given that we have eaten about three quarters of the salad, we felt we should give extra tips. I thought we should round up the bill to $30.00 (we could not remember how much the salad cost - and we could not be bothered to get the menu to check again). Mrs Credit Card thought that $28.00 was enough and at the end, we rounded the bill to $28.00 (Consider $3.00 the normal tip amount and $3.00 as extra). I personally thought we should have rounded up the bill slightly more.

What would you have done if you were in our shoes? Would you have even gave any extra tip at all? If so, how much would you have tipped?

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The Mr Credit Card family was in New York over the weekend. The kids had a great time in the Museum of Natural History, visiting the Statue of Liberty, Toys R Us and the M&M Outlet at 48th at Broadway.

On Sunday (April Fools Day) after visiting the Statue of Liberty, we made our way to Little Italy and Chinatown. We ended up walking along Mott street and having lunch at a Chinese restaurant.

Unlike many Chinese Restaurants, this one looked like a franchise. Its’ interior was yellow and orange and the waitresses were also dressed in orange uniforms.

I can’t really remember the name, but this was what we ordered. My three kids shared a Wonton Noodle Soup and another bowl of Wonton Soup. Mrs Credit Card and myself has a bowl of Hot and Sour Soup, Chicken and Mushroom Rice in a Claypot, and a Pork Liver with Ginger Porridge. We also got some Rice Roll with BBQ Pork. The Wonton Soup was quite good and so was the Pork Liver Porridge. The Hot and Sour soup was only OK and th Rice Roll with BBQ Pork was not too great (though the kids enjoyed it!).

(Topleft) - Wonton Noodle Soup, (Top Right) - Chicken Mushroom Claypot Rice, (Bottom Left) - Hot and Sour Soup, (Bottom Right) - Ork Liver Porridge

When it was all over, I asked for the bill and then found out that they did not accept any credit cards! Well, I thought that there was a chance of this happening in Chinatown but certainly not in nice restaurant like this one. I am not the type of person who carries a lot of cash. But fortunately for me, Mrs Credit Card came to the rescue. The bill turned out to be only $19.50, which was very cheap and reasonable in my opinion.

Part 2

The hotel that we stayed at was the Hampton Inn Chelsea at 24th street between 6th and 7th Ave.

The Hotel recommended us to a 24 hour car park on 25th street and said we would get a discount as we were staying at the hampton Inn. It turned out that we would be charged $36 a day. On the day that we were leaving, I went to collect the car, and was told I needed the hotel to “stamp” on the ticket to prove that I had stayed at the Hampton Inn. So I went to get my stamp from the hotel. I went back to the parking lot and as I was about to pay, I asked if they accepted credit cards? “No” was the answer. So as usual, there wasn’t any cash in my pockets. The parking attendant told me that there was a Chase bank just across the street.

Carpark that only accepts cash!

Off I went again back to the hotel. Once again, Mrs Credit Card came to the rescue with two fifty dollar bills! I finally got my car out, stuffed our bags in and left New York City. It was a great trip and weekend away, but it was interesting to find places that still only accept cash! What a great business.