I get needing expiration dates back when they first came out, but it seems sort of antiquated in today’s world.
In: 17
It allows a few things:
Technology updates, give you new cards, chip and pin and Tap etc…
Fraud stuff, its a safeguard to prevent identity theft etc…
Credit itself, allows them to re-assess your credit and offer a different card, rate, limit etc… periodically.
And the last and likely most important… you never want to just offer to lend someone something open ended forever.
If you offer me a $50,000 Credit limit, and I never use it, but it just floats out there.. like 23 years later I could use it suddenly.
Banks and other lenders need to keep track of how much potentially money they’ve agreed to lend and track risks.
If they just let unused cards continue to exist for decades with no expiry it’d just create this huge unnecessary liability and risk they’re obligated to track and it’s just not worth it.
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