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Holiday Shoppers Say They'll Go Easy On Credit Cards

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By MICHAEL SASSO

The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 17, 2008

Already up to their eyeballs in debt, shoppers are expected to use cash and debit cards slightly more often than last year to buy holiday gifts, but credit card usage should fall.

Today, the National Retail Federation released the results of a survey of 8,758 consumers on their likely holiday shopping habits.

Among shoppers polled, 41.5 percent expect to use debit cards as their primary method of payment, up from 40.1 percent in 2007. An additional 22.8 percent of shoppers expect to pay primarily with cash, up from 22.1 percent in 2007.

If shoppers do as they indicated on the survey, they might put away their plastic.

Use of credit cards as the primary payment method is expected to fall slightly to 31.5 percent this year, down from 32.3 percent in 2007.

The poll was conducted for the National Retail Federation by BIGresearch from Nov. 5 through Tuesday. The margin of error is plus or minus 1 percentage point.

Reporter Michael Sasso can be reached at (813) 259-7865 or msasso@tampatrib.com.

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