Motivational Story 03 (YOU ARE NOT ALONE)

This was posted on the Credit Counselling Singapore website. Reproduced from http://www.ccs.org.sg/alone.html as follows:

Story from Mr Ben (in his 40s):

This is my story:I am working as a Manager drawing a salary of S$6,000 per month. To many people I know, this is an upper salary bracket. However, to me this is the minimum sum required to keep my family survive. This amount do not include allowance for food. My wife has to work to help me make ends meet. And I only have one son who is in secondary school now. This is because three quarter of my salary is used to pay my credit card debts.

Sounds tough ... it was tougher two years ago when almost all the banks who had issued me with credit cards, magnified and spelled out the fine wordings stated in the terms and conditions that I had earlier signed; except I must add CITIBANK who was quick to equitably help me restructure my credit card debt to term loan. The same banks who had for many, many years loan me the money and treat me like VIP as a customer at the front counter had now transferred my acounts to their Collection Dept who termed me legally as debtor. The legal language switched from Banking Act to Bankruptcy Act. Many are armed with willing lawyers who had memorised the Bankruptcy Act by heart to prey on obviously unrepresented debtor. Some of the banks employed licenced 'Tai Long' who are fond of offending and breaching the debtor's privacy. It was a very tough period for me; psychologically.

I requested the help of The Association Bank of Singapore who directed me to Credit Counselling Singapore (CCS). The latter had helped me mitigate the situation by summarising my expenses and expenditure thereby showed me my financial strong and weak point. My financial situation was dire; I can easily submit to bankruptcy but I opt to be responsible for my debts. Now I am still struggling to pay back my debt but at least I can see the light. Four years more and I hope to be free of the credit card debts and bank loans of more than S$100k.

I now prefer Debit Card.

CCS is well recognised by the government, the banks and the courts. My advice is if you are having "credit card problems" talk to them first.

I particularly like the bolded statements.
Use your credit facilities wisely.