What is the difference between a purchase finance charge and a cash finance charge on your credit card?

Question

I saw I got charged for different amounts on both every single month. What is the difference between the two? I have only used my credit card as credit and have never done any cash advantages.

Answer 1

That's very strange that you haven't done any cash advances and have still been charged for a cash finance charge.  I'll tell you that to the very best of my knowledge (and my quick search of Google a second ago) I cannot find a reason why you SHOULD be charged the cash finance charge without having done a cash advance.

Even if you end up with some really good answers here, your best bet is to give a call to your credit card company.  Press zero to go through all the prompts and speak with a representative.  They should be able to explain it from there, if it's correct, or adjust it off if it's incorrect.

Trust me, even huge credit card companies sometimes make mistakes.

Answer 2

Did you ever use a PIN (like a debit card) instead of signature, or use your credit card to pay another credit card or as overdraft protection for a checking account?  Those would have been considered cash advance (unless you used a balance transfer teaser rate) and would have had an extra fee at the time it happened.

To find out what or when, you would have to look back at older statements to see when the cash advance finance charges first appeared.