> I've never owned a credit card. Can you have them automatically pay off the balance every month? It seems like this would cut into their profits.

it's worth noting that issuers generally make money on credit cards. this is in contrast to checking accounts, which are often a loss leader. the card issuer will happily let you screw yourself over (to a point, this is what the credit limit is for), but they won't go out of their way to directly screw you. there's far less incentive to do overtly malicious things like debit reordering (pretty common for checking accounts). [0]

so yes, all major issuers offer autopay. there is a subtlety here in that they don't usually let you autopay your current balance in its entirety. instead, they'll let you autopay the last statement balance at most, which is enough to avoid accruing any interest.

tl;dr: if you keep a decent buffer in your checking account and set up autopay, a credit card is no more trouble than a debit card (and actually less trouble, in some ways).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overdraft#Transaction_processi...