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Other articles in Continued
OLD AND FRAIL BUT PROUD, Page 2 26 August 2009
Homosexuality and the Church, Page 2 21 July 2009
IS MORSE CODE STILL VIABLE COMMUNICATIONS? Page 2 19 May 2009
| THE RIDE TO A CASHLESS SOCIETY, Page 2 |
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| Continued |
| Written by William Duncan |
| Tuesday, 21 July 2009 01:13 |
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Diners Club introduced their "travel and entertainment" charge card in 1950, thus began the first real credit card. The primary concept of the card was to relieve traveling business men from having to carry a lot of cash with them on the road that was the reason Diners Club called it the "travel and entertainment" card. 1958 American Express issued their version of a "travel and entertainment" card called The American Express Card and was followed by The BankAmerica card issued by The Bank of America that same year though The BankAmerica card was only issued and accepted in the state of California at that time.
Quickly others began to join credit card bandwagon and added the convenience of allowing the customer to pay their balance in full or to leave part unpaid and thus pay a finance charge for that amount left over.
The Bank of America wanted to establish market shares outside of California so in 1960 it started licensing other banks to issue their BankAmerica cards and the concept of a group of banks issuing and using the same credit card was born. The Interbank Card Association (ICA) started when 14 banks that met in Buffalo, NY in 1966 to compete with the BankAmerica card.
The concept continued to grow as more people began to turn to the convenience using a card to make their purchases. In 1968 ICA changed its name to MasterCharge (later called MasterCard) and started the trek of a global bank card network by entering into agreements with banks in Mexico, Europe, and Japan.
As the technology continued to develop and debit cards were added to the convenience of the credit card for those who objected to using credit. Card swipe with the merchant not even touching the card is the norm now. Checks are scanned electronically, cleared, stamped as processed electronically, and given back to the customer.
The days of needing to carry cash are all but gone. There are a few places where cash is useful but these places are becoming fewer every day and the day could be in the not so distant future when cash will be not just unnecessary but unused; maybe even outlawed.
Is that good or is that bad? The answer to that question may be totally irrelevant because with the speed in which we are moving in that direction it will surely happen whether we like it or not.
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