Thanks for tips. I agree with you, that with good discipline, we can instead turn the tide and make credit cards our friend instead.
I have been very discipline in making sure of full payment each time I received the statement and in the same time, making full use of all the benefits of the credit cards. A few things that I have been very pleased of in using credit cards are:

1) Large purchases – Usually when me and my wife aims for a large purchase, or even paying for an event at hotel, we will save up the money and use credit card to pay for it. This way we can earn the points, and in many cases, we can call up the bank and ask for 12 month free installments. This really helps, because with monthly installment, we can play around with our extra cash in hand.

2) Redemption of points – Usually we will only redeem shopping or travel vouchers, and not the other merchandise. Having realize that most merchandise offered are either not in good quality or only looks good in catalogue, we always go for shopping vouchers like Tesco, Jusco or even AirAsia (Citibank). We won’t feel the worth of the points if we redeem a gift and leave it at home for home use or sometimes for deco purpose, but we will surely feel the worth of it, when we use RM100 Tesco voucher to pay for our groceries shopping.

All in all, I think discipline is the key word here. With good discipline and planning, we really can turn the tide!

Kenneth