My first credit card

I still remember when I was 18 years old and got my first credit card. I was so happy that I was going to finally going to start building some credit. The credit limit was only $200 and I figured that I would make some charges, pay them off and get my limit increased in no time. Well, the problem with this logic was that I was only 18 earning minimum wage. I was also more in to partying than remembering to pay my bills or even paying attention to how much I was spending. I quickly went over my limit and racked up a bunch of fees. My balance eventually reached around $2,000 because I could make my payments, this meant fees and huge amounts of interest. In an effort to get me back on my feet, my mom paid the entire bill off for me, which was a huge burden lifted from my shoulders.

The next month came and I received another bill for $50. I quickly called the credit card company to ask why there was a balance when the card was paid off. The told me that there were some fees that I still owed, so I sent them a check. This went on for about 3 months, every month I'd get a bill for somewhere between $50 and $75. I kept calling and they kept telling me that I still owed fees. It was at this point that I started realizing that I needed to keep better records about what and when I was paying. I eventually got sick of paying them every month, so I stopped and let it go to collections. I argued my case to the collection company, however, they really don't care, they just want there money. The credit card company eventually did a charge off for the remainder and got to take the debt as a loss. I found this sort of funny because for about $225 worth of actual charges that I made, they received roughly $2,200 of which was mostly fees and interest.

I really took a loss with this credit card company, however what they don't realize is the loss they take now because I will never get a credit card from them again.