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The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship among affective loyalty, perceived benefits, attitude towards co‐branded products and the intention to use such products.

In total, 433 valid responses were collected from active bank/department store co‐branded credit card holders, from four major Chinese cities. Regression and t‐test analyses were used to test the hypotheses.

The findings revealed that affective loyalty to the bank and the department store, as well as perceived credit card benefits, all positively influence consumers' attitude toward bank/department store co‐branded credit cards. Additionally, results showed a positive relationship between attitude and intention. Moreover, gender differences were also found to be significant in affective loyalty to the bank and the department store, as well as with the intention to use co‐branded credit cards.

The paper contributes to the co‐branding literature by gaining a better understanding of co‐branded partners in symbiotic marketing collaboration.

This exploratory study seeks to explore the link between the choices of payment mode to customer satisfaction. It examines the Austrian market in relation to its choice and usage of debit cards versus credit cards and its impact on customer satisfaction and loyalty. Furthermore, the study aims to identify the key drivers of customer satisfaction for these two modes of electronic payment.

A structured questionnaire was administered in person to 360 Austrian bank customers. These customers were selected using quota sampling based on Austrian census data for a particular Austrian province. However, while the quota sampling was used to determine the categories, selection of the actual respondents was done through systematic sampling. This ensured that the sample was representative of the population of that Austrian province who had credit and debit cards. One group, women who were 65 and older, were not considered as there were relatively few women in this age range who had debit and credit cards.

Five hypotheses were proposed. Four of the five hypotheses were supported while one, H4, had partial support. Essentially, the results indicate that a person's preference for a particular payment method is dependent on his/her personal characteristics. Additionally, the payment method's features and characteristics influenced its desirability and acceptance. Furthermore, a person's expectations had an impact on his/her attitude toward the payment method. The study also found that positive expectations, performance, and desires led to customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction, in turn, leads to a higher degree of intent to use the payment method and higher degree of intent to recommend the payment method. These results are consistent with the literature on customer satisfaction that identifies expectations, performance and desires as the drivers of customer satisfaction.

Multiple payment modes have emerged but there has been scant attention paid to the effects of payment modes on customer behavior and by extension, customer satisfaction and loyalty. This paper addresses these issues.

The purpose of this paper is to present exploratory research into the holding and usage of credit cards by a distinct segment of the Chinese population, who are “early adopters” of this product.

Primary data collection using survey methodology. A sample of the urban‐affluent population in China was utilized to gauge preferences and attitudes towards the use of credit cards.

The respondents were comfortable with the holding and use of credit cards and particularly recognised their value for spending on travel and entertainment. The research also identified purchase trigger points, which indicated that the use of credit cards for purchases above certain value was already prevalent with this sample of urban‐affluent Chinese consumers.

The sample was drawn from a narrower base than the actual target population of urban‐affluent market, but an available and valid respondent set, which offers insights into the “early‐adopters” of the credit card product in China.

Hitherto there has been a very limited amount of research into payment cards in China and yet with the market for financial services opening up in China from 2007, this research is timely both for domestic Chinese banks wishing to issue credit cards and for foreign entrants, seeking to enter the Chinese market via their expertise in credit cards.

The paper presents focused research on the attitudes towards credit cards, with the urban‐affluent consumers, who are the most likely early‐adopters of this product.

Purpose – This paper focuses on a unique historical case study of industry evolution in order to develop a road map where historical and strategic research could develop a common ground for trans-disciplinary inquiry.

Design/methodology/approach – The industry I explore is the Universal Credit Card Industry since its inception with the Diners Club in 1949 until its maturity in late 1990s. My empirical objective here is to develop a historically detailed and theoretically rich case study in which evolutionary processes are discovered as a result of the historical narrative.

Findings – The historical account of the industry demonstrates how the evolution of alternative business models as organizing forms has led to the establishment of interorganizational platforms with unique ecosystems. These alternative business models, through various experimentations, have ultimately produced two critical interorganizational organizations, one based on an open-loop system represented by Visa and MasterCard, and the other based on a closed-loop system represented by Diners Club and the American Express. The historical account also shows that in a given industry competition is not only among specific firms in the industry but also among the business models and the platforms created by these models.

Originality/value – I conclude that historical analyses reveal the nature of competition not only among firms but also among alternative business models where traditional strategy research rarely covers.

Following a discussion of the total United Kingdom market for plastic cards, detailed information is given about the number and nature of retailer credit cards (store cards) currently issued in the United Kingdom. Retailers in the USA and Italy are already competing with the traditional financial institutions in the market for financial services, and comment is made on their strategies and their results so far. Retailers in the United Kingdom are also moving into the provision of financial services and they are using their well developed in‐house credit card databases to help launch these new products. They are also examining ways to enhance the attractiveness of their credit card offerings, to differentiate them further from the MasterCard/Visa credit cards and hence compete more effectively with the banks in the provision of credit.

The importance of and viability of the college student cohort for credit card firms and banks are well documented and so are the challenges facing marketers interested in this target market. The first purpose of this paper is to examine college students’ motivation for consuming credit cards and the usefulness of the latter to them. The second purpose relies on marketing scholars’ advice by replicating and then validating an extant scale that measures college students’ decision criteria for credit cards. Specifically, the paper attempts to answer two questions: what is the compelling reason for a college student to want to own and use a credit card? In addition, how important is the credit card to the college student?

The authors adopted the classical multi‐step scale development procedure, which demands that thorough attention is paid to every step of the process. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to assess the reliability and validity of the results.

This study has replicated and validated an extant scale measuring college students’ consumption of credit cards. The findings confirm four key factors: “customer service;” “incentives;” “need for credit;” and “buying power.” In addition, 66 per cent of the respondents claim that credit cards provide a sense of security for them. Furthermore, while 49 per cent of the sample uses their cards up to three purchases monthly, 51 per cent use their cards more than four times in a month. Moreover, 25 per cent of the respondents regularly use their cards (i.e. more than seven purchases or more per month).

The cross‐sectional research basis and convenience samples are weaknesses of this study, as they pose generalizability questions. Although the study is consistent with the literature and directions from academic and practitioner experts, the authors acknowledge the lack of (true experimental) control over the identified factors.

Credit card marketers and bank managers may assess the dimensions in this study and adapt them as the basis for marketing and positioning strategies, marketing communication tactics, and brand management, particularly within the college student and the youth target markets. This can lead to the basis upon which credit card policies, i.e. college students’ compulsive buying habits, college students’ credit card debt, and banks’ marketing activities may be proposed.

The paper proposes a rigorously validated scale that reflects both psychometric and parsimonious measures dealing with college students’ consumption of credit cards. In view of the scarce stream of empirical studies dealing with college students’ consumption of credit cards, this paper comes at an opportune time as scholars continue to debate and research about college students’ credit card debt and credit card firms’ ethical practices on college campuses. Moreover, the paper supports the importance of generalizability of findings and replication studies.

The rapid growth of credit card use in China poses the potential for card overuse and the accumulation of increased debt. The purpose of this paper is to report on an investigation into the determinants of overall credit card spending and card-financed debt by Chinese consumers.

This study focusses on two dependent variables: credit card monthly spending and card debt. The spending measure is based on consumer outlay for the month preceding the survey. Card debt is the consumers’ outstanding credit card debt when the survey was conducted. Three groups of independent measures are used: socio-demographic characteristics, card features and consumer attitude towards money. Both card spending and card debt are estimated with OLS methods. Data was obtained from the 2013 China Household Finance Survey of 1,920 households in 29 provinces and 262 counties across China that used credit cards over the survey period.

The empirical findings suggest consumers’ attitude towards money is more important in explaining card spending and debt variation than socio-demographic characteristics and card features. The credit limit set for a card, obligations to other loans and the method of paying for ordinary shopping exhibit positive effects on both card spending and card debt, while age exhibits a negative effect. Further, card spending is positively correlated with card debts, but the factors that determine card spending do not necessarily affect card debt and vice versa. Minimum card debt payments, cash advances, card tenure and interest-bearing debt have no effect on card spending but have positive effects on card debt. In addition, gender and income have opposite effects on card spending and debt.

The relationships we have documented suggest several actions the Chinese Government could consider dealing with credit card debt risk. Controlling the aggressive promotional campaigns that card issuers use to attract consumers and aggressive credit policies should be a focus of attention. The Chinese Government might, for example, impose minimum age and income requirements for granting credit cards and prohibit issuance of new cards to applicants who are already in debt with other types of credit. In addition, more stringent criteria to curb increases in card limits and tighter control over cash advances made on cards should be applied. Minimum payment amounts can also be increased in order to reduce credit card debt risk.

Despite ample documentation of consumers’ credit card behaviour, the literature is deficient in at least two areas of enquiry. First, most previous research has investigated either credit card spending behaviour or card debt, but not both. Second, with few exceptions, most research has investigated a range of specific factors that affect credit card use. In contrast, this study investigates card spending as well as card debt behaviour using a wide variety of consumer dimensions particularly relevant to credit card use and resulting debt. In addition, this study focusses on Chinese consumers, who traditionally prefer to save first and delay spending. The impact of the rapid growth of credit card use on this traditional Chinese orientation towards spending is dynamic. Documenting the influence of the individual factors examined in this study is likely to be of value to both policy makers and institutions that offer and manage credit in this changing environment.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact that several of these factors have on a consumer’s decision to hold a credit card, as well as those involved in determining the level of credit card limit.

Potential explanatory variables were identified in the literature, then used to build a binary logit model to test the impact of the card and consumer characteristics on credit card ownership. Data were collected via a structured interview of 409 consumers living in Hebei Province, China.

The results indicate that convenience in use, level of credit card interest rates, the application process, number of people in the household, a rewards programme, marital status, credit limit and age influence the likelihood of the respondent holding a credit card. Further, an anaylsis shows that the number of credit cards held, duration of holding a credit card, monthly credit card purchasing volume and having a degree at the tertiary level, are significantly and positively related to different levels of credit limit.

In summary, in order to attract more consumers to credit card use, the banks and credit card companies should consider making it more convenient for consumers to use their credit cards. Moreover, banks can increase their networking and degree of cooperation with merchants to increase the acceptance of payment by credit card. The most heavily used businesses such as supermarkets and smaller retailers, where consumers purchase goods frequently, would be good targets for banks’ attention. In addition, banks might also improve credit card reward programmes to make these more efficient and perhaps increase the size of the rewards customers can earn through card use.

By testing a moderated mediation model, the purpose of this paper is to examine the mediating role of credit card self-efficacy in the relationship between credit card literacy and financial well-being. The authors further examine if credit card number moderates this effect.

Data for the study were collected from 427 college students. The PROCESS macros in IBM SPSS Statistics 23 was used to assess the hypothesized relationships.

Credit card literacy positively influences financial well-being through self-efficacy. However, this effect is stronger when college students own fewer credit cards.

Banks and credit card issuers, policymakers and colleges and universities should place a greater emphasis on credit card literacy programs that enhance students’ general understanding of credit card terms and conditions and confidence in their ability to effectively use and manage their credit cards.

To our knowledge, this is the first study to examine the relationship between credit card literacy, self-efficacy and financial well-being.

Given the proliferation of the credit card industry in today’s US households, and the aggressive promotional tactics employed to get college students to sign on as customers, this exploratory study takes a look at the credit card activity of college students at one Midwestern campus. The majority of students surveyed did not report knowledge of their credit card interest rate, although approximately half did report knowing their credit balance and credit limit. Students appear to have a realistic attitude toward the use of credit cards.