Has credit awareness week opened your eyes?

May 22, 2007

Credit Awareness Week was started to help consumers to get a better knowledge of their finances and to try and help them to understand their debts. Whilst running, it studied consumer’s attitudes and patterns when it came to spending and it seems that more than half of Britons admit that they are terrible with money.

In fact the results show that many Britons get extra credit cards to pay off their balance of existing debts. The trend in most people’s spending is that they borrow far too much than what they can afford because it seems like a good offer at the time. This is especially true with ‘buy now pay later’ schemes and when the payment date is a year down the line you really do not bother to think about the consequences.

It is thought that one of the main reasons why people get into debt is because of comfort spending. When something goes wrong people (and women in particular) tend to go out shopping to buy something nice for themselves. This is the main reason why people get into debt on their credit cards and it is something which is difficult to stop.

The main findings of Credit Awareness Week show that most people do not have much awareness when it comes to their finances. They do not consider the implications of what borrowing has on their credit report and in fact most of them do not even know what their credit report actually is. This clearly shows us as a nation that we need to start being a little more careful with how we spend our money.

Lately people have started to become a little more aware of what they are spending and whether they really need to spend it. Gradually if this continues then the debt crisis will decrease, but until then Britons do have to start becoming more and more aware of their credit reports and what being in debt can do to them.