I Hate Hearing These Mistakes College Kids Make

By Larry Chiang

My expertise has been recognized by a Stanford Law professor who invited me to launch a credit bill. I also got to chip in on another law passed by Duck Durbin (D-IL Darn you autocorrect, it’s, Dick Durbin, democrat Senator from Illinois).

This expertise centers around credit card and credit laws.

I hate hearing about mistakes that college students will make…, are making, have made.

Avoid these common mistakes I have documented in the public record stating my position and direct regurgitation of US law. Avoid these common pitfalls:

-1- US Credit laws are counter-intuitive.

It’s a mistake to use common sense. College students often say, “Do you like causing confusion?! It’s like you want to stupefy us.”

Quite the opposite, young lass (I’m addressing women because females are very enthused about the security). Quite the opposite, I hate that what I know, few know.

For example: US credit laws are written to protect you and your credit disputes when you use the us postal service. Credit bureaus and banks are required to read and respond to mail sent to their PO Boxes.

The banks and credit bureaus are allowed to lie to you over the phone and delete your email.*

*PO Boxes and mailing banks and credit bureaus mail is adhering to us credit laws. USA credit laws are ALL based on 1970s tech.

Until the “Larry Chiang, Electronic Credit Score Protection Act” passes, keep using stamps

-2- Leverage this credit trivia

Greenland is icy and Iceland is green.

Did you know that??!

FreeCreditReport.con

isn’t free. But

AnnualCreditReport.com

is.

Here is proof.

Here is your video embedded where you regurgitate this simple fact (email me your YouTube and I’ll payPal you a mystery dollar amount)

My email is larry@duck9.com

Here is more proof that you can profit** from https://www.duck9.com/Duck9-free-credit-report-Request.pdf

(Note the address Re: AnnualCreditReport

Note the ease of execution via a paper form versus the very difficult online version

Note the fact that you can “sell” headache free credit reports for $10 as per this Mark Cuban blog post https://bit.ly/mcuban710)

3) Turn your credit card into a debit card

It’s a massive mistake to use your debit card. Your debit card creates more fees for your bank than your credit card.

Why?

“Authorization holds”

It is non intuitive bank language that says “if you buy 20.00 in gas, you must have more than 20 in your debit card account”

Authorization holds means that if you pay for a hotel room that costs $125.00, you must have appx 175.00+ in your account.

Authorization holds cause you to get charged overdraft fees for small transactions even though you have the cash just sitting there in your account.

For example,

You spend $25, $45, $5.59, $$80, $7.90, $19.50, $3.50

You have enough money for all of this…

… How many “OVERDRAFT $35” can they hit you with if your balance is hovering near 300?

Answer a lot

Answer: turn your credit card into a debit card

4) Its a mistake to accidentally turn your debit card into a credit card

The general population pays a lot of fees for debit cards.

As a college student, turn your credit card into a debit card by paying your credit card off every Thursday. As a college student, turn your credit card into a debit card by recording all of your purchase transactions. As a engineering student, help other students turn credit cards into a debit cards by developing an app using existing API’s

Yes, I speak at a lot of freshman orientations, random Delta Sig leadership conferences and crash undergrad student dining halls.

I’m getting tired of drafting this blog post on my iPhone, so I’ll rattle off a couple more

It is a mistake to never use paper checks.

Use paper checks to pay for parking tickets. Use paper checks to pay a credit card bank 5.00 when you owe zero***

It’s a mistake to not be anal about 24 on time payments in a row.

Make 24 on-time payments to a credit card bank in the amount of $5.00 – $25.00.

It’s a mistake to think that zero credit blemishes means you have good credit.

It’s a mistake to think that checking your credit hurts your credit.

A lot of this stuff is confusing to read. Text me and I’ll walk you through a specific question

Text me and I’ll help you with a specific roadblock

It’s a mistake to not graduate with a high fico credit score over 720.

Yes. Yes, you should make 24 on time payments and augment your credit score to up over 700