【答案解析】[解析] 14-22
Credit Card History
The concept of credit cards began just before World War Ⅰ, in 1914, when Western Union provided a deferred-payment service to its most sound customers. It wasn't until 1950 that Diners Club issued the first real "card". This card could be used in a number of different locations.
Quickly the idea caught on and within about a year, banks began providing cards to their customers, and merchants began accepting them for payment. These early cards required payment in full within a short period of time, usually less than 90 days. The income possibilities soon became apparent to the bankers. The financial institutions could simply extend the repayment time, attach an interest rate and overnight, a new profit center for New York's Franklin National, in 1951, had introduced the first modern credit card to its customers.
Before 1970, the concept was being quickly accepted. Consumers and the issuing banks were feeling that one bank, one card was not enough. Banks of America solved this by entering into licensing agreements with banks outside California allowing them to issue BankAmericard and interchange transactions among the licensees.
In order to increase usage, a bank card association was started which would change the name to one which was not linked with any one bank. In 1977, the Visa name was adopted, a membership corporation was formed, and Visa USA was started. At the same time, three different groups of banks that were not franchisees of Bank of America began activities that would later merge to become today's MasterCard International.