Men and women spend differently by credit card

Men are more likely to use their plastic to fill up their tanks and eat out, while women are more likely to make clothes and retail purchases.

According to the survey by CreditDonkey.com, 16.5 percent of men's spending is on restaurants, while women's is only 7.8 percent and men's petrol purchase ranks 37 percent compared with women's 26.6 percent.

We conform to gender stereotypes

Women come out tops in the online buying department with 25 percent versus their male counterpart's 22 percent and also spend 7.8 percent on jewellery and large appliances compared to 7.1 percent for men. Unsurprisingly, men also lay out for alcohol and hardware, but women hand over their cards more in pharmacies and department stores. It's revealing that we seem to conform to gender stereotypes in our credit card usage.

Nine percent of men admit to using their credit cards every day, while only 4.2 percent of women use theirs daily. Women were also more likely to say that they stopped using their credit cards in the last five years.

The recession has also affected the spending habits of both South African men and women who, although they have picked up the plastic again, have also both become more cautious about owing money as well as interest payments on their cards.

There are also gender differences when it comes to paying the minimum amount for credit cards every month, as 13.4 percent of men pay their minimum amount each month compared with 15.2 percent of women; 20.9 percent of men and 15.2 percent of females pay a lot more than the minimum amount sometimes, but 31.3 percent of men and 35.5 percent of women pay the full amount owed each month.

Compounding interest

Paying anything less than the balance each month is dangerous practice for anyone using a card for consumables like food, petrol and retail. Doing that puts you at risk of accumulating debt and paying compounding interest.

So, ultimately, women are at slightly less risk than men for credit card debt. But do you use your card more when you're feeling poorer? On the other hand, women are more likely to use their credit cards when they feel financially stressed than men - so that is a potential pitfall to be aware of. They also report more often having to choose which bills to pay and which to put off each month.

In the current economic climate and where the recession is still affecting business and the cost of living is increasing, we need to be conscious of the way we use our money. The more that we can recognise and be aware of our spending habits, the more control we have over our behaviour and our financial future.