Whether it's a credit card, a car loan, or a mortgage, every advice monger gives the same worthless advice: "Be sure to read the fine print."
This is a dumb suggestion. Unless you're a law professor - or have nothing else to do for the rest of your life - the fine print will always win. In fact, it is supposed to.
By design, fine print is not meant to be read. Although the font is rarely smaller these days, the important stuff is always deliberately confusing.
People who craft the fine print know what they're doing. They obfuscate. That is their job.
They use long sentences, convoluted phrases and unfamiliar concepts to purposely confuse the reader. Well, that's easy. I could have been a fine-print master.
The goal is not only to confuse but also to dissuade people from reading. Fine print authors presume that 90 percent of readers will eventually stop reading ridiculous verbiage. And they're right. Most people just give up.
This policy of creating breakage - when people quit reading a memo or filing a complaint - is common in many consumer situations. For example, health insurers make reimbursement forms hard to understand so that some percentage of people just won't bother.
So forget the fine print. Here's my advice instead.
Speak to someone at the credit card issuer, the car dealer or the mortgage lender. Tell him or her you have 10 questions, and you want to record the answers for "quality assurance."
Don't quit until you get those answers on tape. By the way, recorded answers will generally stand up in court.
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