Originally Posted by marble
I'm having a bit of a problem which I'm sure other people must have had in the past. I'm looking to rent a car in Canada in a few weeks time, but don't have a credit card. I have a Visa debit but just don't have a credit one (never had the need - too dangerous!). I always just assumed that Visa was Visa.
If you were assuming that Visa was Visa, you may be assuming incorrect things about what is more dangerous, too!
If someone steals your credit card, and charges $1000, you are at most liable for the first $50 of that, and all your checks that you wrote two days ago clear just fine, because it's a separate account.
If someone steals your debit card, and charges $1000, your checks all bounce, and even if the bank eventually reverses your bounce charges, the bounce charges that the companies you wrote the checks to will probably never reverse.
Now, if you have a debit card which requires a pin (and can't be used as a Visa), then that's less dangerous. But if your debit card has a Visa logo, it's MORE dangerous than a credit card.
(Meanwhile, if by "dangerous" you meant that you can't trust YOURSELF, then what you should do is get a no-annual-fee credit card and then insist that the bank cap it at a certain amount. Then, if you continue to use your Visa debit card, make yourself a rule that you only will use the credit card for things like car rentals where it causes problems not to have a true credit card. I know of a number of people who have a particular credit card that they use only for car rentals -- because of the extra coverage that card has -- and so it wouldn't be strange for you to use your ONLY credit card only for car rentals.)