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You may know them as those annoying scraps of paper that litter your purse or flutter from your wallet at inopportune moments, but receipts for credit card transactions are actually worth paying attention to.

Here's what you probably didn't know about them, but should:

Receipts are more secure than you think ... Unless a merchant made a big mistake, you won't see your whole credit card number on a receipt. That's because the federal Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act -- an amendment to the Fair Credit Reporting Act that took effect in 2006 -- legislated that for better financial security, only the last four or five digits of your card number can appear. That's why you see something like XXX-XXXX-1234 instead. Your card expiration date can't show either.
9 things you should know about your credit card receipt

... but receipts aren't totally thief-proof

If you’re struggling with too much debt you’re not alone. It seems as if the whole nation has a borrowing hangover. For years, credit was easy and many people became overextended. But, we now live in an era of austerity and it’s time to get our affairs in order.

The five strategies you may want to avoid

Like a fairy-tale curse, poor money skills can screw up your kids, their kids and their kids' kids.

Good money habits, on the other hand, can insulate kids from making major mistakes later in life and will positively impact their quality of life as adults.

To raise money-smart kids, parents should start at a young age and regularly reinforce money lessons as children grow up.

Unfortunately not all parents consciously try to foster money skills in their offspring. A recent survey by TrueCredit.com found that about 20 percent of parents, nearly one in five, had never spoken with their kids between the ages of 4 and 18 about money basics.

Learn how to budget

Debt, for many people today, is simply a fact of life. It's the way they pay for just about everything from big-ticket items like homes and cars to daily purchases like gasoline and chewing gum. At its most basic definition, debt is simply an amount of money borrowed by one party from another. Under this definition, debt sounds neither good nor bad. A closer look at the subject provides a more sophisticated way of both viewing indebtedness.

Good Debt

If you’re job hunting, you expect hiring managers to check your resume.

But you shouldn't be surprised if potential employers delve into another aspect of your personal life -- your credit history -- and turn you down if they don't like what they see.

That's why job seekers should know their rights when companies start to scrutinize their financial history and be ready to deal with unflattering information that could sink an application.

When the Society for Human Resource Management asked employers how frequently they conduct credit checks on job candidates, 40% said they never do, while only 13% said they always do.

But nearly half of employers in the society's 2010 survey said they run credit checks ...

As big banks across the country test the waters for ways to tack on new checking account fees, the federal financial watchdog agency Thursday launched a new website for consumers to file complaints about debit cards, checking accounts and other banking-related services.

Consumers who can't resolve problems with their banks now have a one-stop option for lodging banking complaints with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). Those who don't have access to computers can call the bureau's toll-free hotline at 855-411-CFPB (2372).

Consumers can gripe about bank account services to one federal agency

If you've ever read money advice that didn't seem to apply to your situation, you may have been right.

Guidance that makes sense for a middle-income household might not apply if you're under the poverty line. If your income is on the lower end, you'll have different priorities and concerns than if your W-2 has six figures before the decimal point.

So I've tailored some tips using five income brackets that correspond, roughly, with the five income quintiles defined by the latest Current Population Survey, conducted jointly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau. Each bracket represents about 20% of U.S. households. There's plenty of overlap, since tips that apply to one bracket often apply to the ones above it as well. But these bits of advice will give you some idea of what you should focus on now.

Low income: Below $20,000

Remember a few years ago when millions of Americans spent beyond their means, racked up a bunch of credit card debt, and then ran into trouble when global financial markets tanked and the housing market went under?

It seems old habits die hard, according to a new study by credit card comparison website CardHub, which found that consumers are charging more on their credit cards again.

Americans racked up nearly $48 billion in new credit card debt in 2011, 424 percent more than what they charged in 2010, and 577 percent more than in 2009. Although total outstanding credit rose only about $4 billion, that number was largely offset by the magnitude of consumer defaults--$44.2 billion worth.

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