What if you lost your wallet tomorrow? How many different cards do you have? Do you keep any others anyplace else?
I’m not sure I will ever have multiple credit cards. I like to keep it simple.
But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s the importance of having access to money in multiple places, in multiple ways.
I have quite a few scattered bank accounts (that’s the result of having had my mortgage with a couple of different banks). One of them, I have never activated my card for, as I only ever used it for online transfers.
And I was never more grateful for all of them when my bank account was hacked. Otherwise, I’d probably not have been able to access any money at all…
Likewise when I recently went through a weird patch of losing stuff. I managed to drop my credit card on the escalator at the train station – swallowed into the bowels of the moving steps. I lost my debit card somewhere else (I assume somewhere between the train station and my car). Then I somehow lost the card I got as a replacement for THAT card (much later found down the side of Spud’s bed – it must have slid out and fallen down while I was sitting reading to him).
With all this going on, I was never totally cut off. I always had card access to at least one account.
Having those various accounts (and splitting cards between my wallet and my phone holder) has built in redundancies and contingencies for me. And for that, I’m very glad.
Also, maybe I should set up Apple Pay…
How many accounts/cards do you have? What’s your system like?
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