Credit Card Tax : Good Objective, BAD Implementation

There is no change to the planned RM50 service tax for credit cards from next year, Deputy Finance Minister Datuk Chor Chee Heung said.

Chor added that some banks and finan­cial institutions were indirectly picking up the tab by offering certain promotions.

“If the banks want to keep their customers, they should offer to pay for their card-holders,” he said.

Honestly, the objective was good to ensure more prudent spending but the design of the implementation somehow left me wonder if it fits the objective.

Let's assume this is a measure or campaign of spending wisely, therefore it assumes that if one has less cards.. would have less opportunity ( less credit ) to utilise.

This sounds true BUT does reducing number of cards has effect on credits ??? This makes me wonder if reducing cards reduces future credits ??? What if I utilise 1000 credits per month but spread across 5 cards when each card has a card limit of 5000 - 1000 ? Theoretically, my spending habit may not have change even if I were to reduce from 5 cards to 2 - 3 cards...

With so many banks either promoting to have alternatives to balance off the 50 ringgit tax, I wonder if the implementation makes any sense now....


Not sure if reducing cards was a better measure than have a more prudent limit control based on various modelling ( or simulation )...

I for one, felt the effect of the annnouncement.... and what did I do ? From my list of credit cards... citibank and hong leong bank credit cards are effectively off my wallet... that's like 5 cards off...now, HSBC and AMEX are still intact though

Did my spending pattern change because of the announcement ? Hmm... I don't think so.