Avoiding Christmas Debt

Holiday sales often pop up before the snow starts to fall, causing some people to pull out their credit cards before their winter jackets. This Holiday season, the National Retail Federation has estimated a 2.3 per cent increase in sales from 2009, a promising forecast for recession-bitten retailers, but troubling news for cash-strapped shoppers.

“Some people are telling us that they’re still paying off last Christmas’s debt,” says Bruce Cran, president of the Consumers Association of Canada. “And they don’t intend to repeat the same mistakes this year.”

According to an October study by Environics Research Group for MasterCard Canada, 48 per cent of Canadians go over their Holiday budget and that’s if they set one at all—one in Read more