Archive for the 'Credit Cards' Category
Saturday, November 14th, 2009
Need to check your credit score? Here’s a new coupon for 26% off real FICO scores and all other credit products at myFico.com. Use the promotional code NOVEMBER26 to get 26% off and a FICO score for less than $12, the best discount currently available:
The code is good until November 30th (although try it anyways and see if it works after that date), so be quick about it. For the Equifax credit score only, you can get it for $10.95 using the code SW94608, which is over 30% off. You enter the promo code relatively late in the buying process, right before entering your credit card information. Look for this:
Experian no longer allows Fair Isaac to sell FICO scores to consumers at all (even though lenders still buy and use them). They sell their own “FAKE-O” version now. Lenders almost always use FICO scores in their decisions, so those are the only ones you should pay for if at all.
For the diligent, a cheaper alternative is to sign up for a free 30-day trial of Scorewatch, which includes two free Equifax scores and reports. Just remember to cancel as soon as you decide you don’t need it anymore. You are allowed to cancel online, without having to even call in.
You can always request your credit reports (not scores) once every 12 months at AnnualCreditReport.com. If you’ve already done that, you can still try these other direct methods for the unemployed, those denied credit, and victims of identity theft.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 2 Comments »
Friday, November 6th, 2009
Here’s a nice credit card offer for those interested in international travel. The Chase British Airways Visa Signature card is offering 50,000 BA Executive Club miles for new cardmembers with first purchase, and another 50,000 BA miles after spending $2,000 within 3 months, for 100,000 miles total. Regular features include earning 1.25 miles per dollar spent. The card does have an annual fee of $75 as well.
50,000 British Airways miles is enough for an economy class transatlantic flight from USA to their “Europe Zone 1″, which includes the United Kingdom, Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands and Switzerland. Note that “all reward flights are subject to taxes, fees, charges and surcharges, including airline surcharges.”, which can add up. I did a quick search and for a random San Francisco (SFO) to London (LHR) flight in March 2010 that cost $807, the taxes and fees alone were $387.
You’ll also need to fly out of a major city that BA services (see route map). Still, two free flights from US to London even for a few hundred dollars each is a big discount for those looking to buy such a ticket anyways.
What if you like to fly in style? 100,000 miles is good for a single business class ticket from USA to Europe Zone 1… and the fees are more reasonable on a relative basis. A business class flight from SFO to Paris (CDG) in March 2010 would have cost around $4,700 in cash, but the fees/taxes are only about $400 as well:
Finally, if you can manage to spend $30,000 a year on the card, you can even earn a 2-for-1 companion voucher. Time to buy some coins? Thanks to reader Paul for the tip.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 15 Comments »
Saturday, October 31st, 2009
The Chase Sapphire Card is a new rewards credit card that is offering 10,000 bonus points after your first purchase on the credit card, which can be redeemed for $100 cash. No annual fee.
As a rewards card, it offers 1 point for every dollar in purchases (100 points = $1, or the usual 1% back). The nice part is that redemptions are easy - you can even redeem in $1 increments as long as above $25, so you could cash out $27 or $113 without anything left over. There are no earning caps, or points expiration dates.
In addition, you can get double points on airfare booked through their Ultimate Rewards website. It also promotes a “premium, dedicated service line that gives you access to a live person anytime, 24/7.” Fine print:
10,000 bonus points
You will qualify for and receive your bonus after your first purchase/first use of the card. First purchase/first use includes purchases, balance transfers, or any checks that are used to access your account, and excludes cash advances. After qualifying, please allow 6 to 8 weeks for bonus points to post to your account. This one-time bonus offer is valid only for first-time cardmembers with new accounts.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 10 Comments »
Friday, October 16th, 2009
The Chase Freedom Card is now offering a $50 cash back bonus after your first purchase. The rewards program itself remains slightly better than the vanilla 1% back cards since they offer 3% back in rotating categories like gas, home improvement and department stores. This sounds like the current Discover card rewards system. You can no longer wait and redeem $200 in cash back rewards for $250 like the good ole’ days, but the rewards never expire and are converted directly to a check mailed to you.
No annual fee, and an intro 0% APR on purchases for 6/12 months. From the T&Cs: “Length of your introductory period will be either 12 billing cycles from account opening for purchases or 6 billing cycles from account opening for purchases depending on our review of your application and credit history.” Basically, this is for folks that would like to grab an easy $50 bonus, take advantage of the 0% APR on purchases, and have a no-hassle backup rewards card.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 40 Comments »
Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
Just a reminder that American Express cardholders can get a free look at their Experian PLUS credit score and credit report once every 12 months. This is Experian’s own proprietary (”FAKO”) credit score, but is the best you can get from Experian since consumers can no longer get their FICO Score based on Experian data. (Only Equifax and Transunion via myFICO.) PLUS has a range of 330-830 as opposed to the FICO range of 300-850, but like all FAKO they don’t necessarily map directly to FICO.
To access your score, visit americanexpress.com/creditreport and log in as usual. It is free, and you do not need to enroll in any trials to get your free score. They will however try to upsell you their CreditSecure monitoring service after 30 days. Just checked for DW:
From their site:
How much does My Credit Score & Report cost?
My Credit Score & Report is a complimentary benefit offered exclusively to American Express Cardmembers. You pay absolutely nothing. Simply sign up to gain access to your Credit Score and Report.
How long will I be enrolled in My Credit Score & Report?
Your enrollment in My Credit Score & Report will last 30 days. After 30 days, you will no longer have access to your complimentary Credit Score and Report. If you wish to continue enjoying access to your Credit Score and Report, you may enroll in CreditSecure.
As always, you can get your free credit reports (not scores) at AnnualCreditReport.com.
Posted in Credit Cards | 20 Comments »
Monday, September 28th, 2009
Meet Bill and Jan. They are my imaginary couple that loves putting their personal finances on auto-pilot. They don’t worry about bill due dates, they never visit the bank, and only check their balances online once a month if there are no e-mail alerts sent to them. (Apparently they also don’t have lips or eyes, so it works well for them…) Let’s take a look at how they do it!
Income
Bill and Jan both elected to receive their regular income via direct deposit, so there are no checks to deposit. Even though Jan does some freelancing, she gets paid via PayPal, which she sets to automatically sweep any money into their bank account at the end of each business day. This feature is called Auto Sweep and is not heavily advertised, you must contact PayPal directly to enable it.
Long-Term Savings
Like everyone else, their 401(k) plans are funded via an automatic deferral each payday. For their Roth IRA, they simply take out $500 per month via an automatic transfer from their checking account for 10 months, which can be set up easily at Vanguard.com or any other major mutual fund provider. If you like individual stocks or ETFs, try automatic investing at Sharebuilder.
Short-Term Savings
For their annual vacation and other savings goals, they have an automatic transfer from their checking to an online savings account like the original ING Direct.
They do keep a certain buffer amount in their checking account, similar to this simple budgeting method. If the balance falls too low for any reason, an e-mail and text message alert are sent to both of them.
Housing
If they had a mortgage, most lenders will happily set up an automatic ACH from bank account each month. If they wanted to set up a biweekly payment plan and it isn’t free, they could simply take out 1/12th of their monthly mortgage payment each month automatically into ING Direct. Once a year, they send one full mortgage payment to their lender.
If they rented, they would set their Online Billpay service to send a snail-mail check automatically each month and deduct the amount from the bank account.
Utilities
Most utility companies will allow to you sign up for them to automatically withdraw the full bill amount from your bank account. Contact them directly, and when available use your credit card to earn some extra rewards.
Insurance
Instead of dealing with large payments either annually or semi-annually, they have signed up for State Farm Payment Plan (SFPP), which groups their insurance premiums and divides them into one single monthly payment which is taken from their bank account. Check with your insurer to see if they have something similar.
Credit Card Bills
Most large credit cards issuers allow you to sign up a service like Citi’s AutoPay, where you can have the full amount sucked out of your bank account each month. Since the Citi Forward card gives you 5x rewards on restaurants and Amazon.com, this most of their disposable income as well. To find it, go to Citicards.com> (Login) > Payments Tab > Enroll in AutoPay.
What else?
With all this set up, all Bill and Jan have to do is show up for work and spend their money wisely. Is there anything else that could make their life even more easy? I thought about using an online grocery store like Peapod, where you can access past orders and possibly create default orders which you only tweak slightly each month.
Posted in Credit Cards, Frugal Living, Investing, Simple Living | 43 Comments »
Saturday, September 26th, 2009
Here’s a newly released coupon for 25% off real FICO scores and all other credit products at myFico.com. Use the promotional code FINANCIALHELP25 to get 25% off and a FICO score for less than $12, the best discount currently available:
The code is good until September 30th (although try it anyways and see if it works after that date), so be quick about it. For the Equifax credit score only, you can get it for $10.95 using the code SW94608, which is over 30% off. You enter the promo code relatively late in the buying process, right before entering your credit card information. Look for this:
Experian no longer allows Fair Isaac to sell FICO scores to consumers at all (even though lenders still buy and use them). They sell their own “FAKE-O” version now. Lenders almost always use FICO scores in their decisions, so those are the only ones you should pay for.
For the diligent, a cheaper alternative is to sign up for a free 30-day trial of Scorewatch, which includes two free Equifax scores and reports. Just remember to cancel as soon as you decide you don’t need it anymore. You are allowed to cancel online, without having to even call in.
You can always request your credit reports (not scores) once every 12 months at AnnualCreditReport.com. If you’ve already done that, you can still try these other direct methods for the unemployed, those denied credit, and victims of identity theft.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 4 Comments »
Monday, August 17th, 2009
I still love getting my bills via snail mail. I avoid online statements because I get over a hundred e-mails a day and it is very easy for me to put it off temporarily and never remember to read the e-mail again. A paper bill will stay on my desk until pay it and I file it away.
However, I essentially got paid $50 to sign up for paperless statements when signing up for the Citi Forward card (see my review), so of course I did it. This month, I barely got my payment in on time, and was only 2 days away from being dinged a $30 late fee.
As a result, I’ve been gradually visiting all my financial provider websites and signing up for online alerts, which e-mail or text you when certain criteria are met. For example, with Citibank I can get alerts for:
Credit Cards
- Current Balance (you choose frequency, up to daily updates)
- Within $XXX of credit limit
- Balance exceeds $XXX
- Payment notification: A payment posted on [xx/xx/xxxx]
- Minimum payment due on [xx/xx/xxxx]
Banking
- Balance Alerts (too high or too low… avoid overdrafts!)
- Deposit Notices alert you whenever funds are credited
- Bill Payment Alerts inform you when there are insufficient funds in checking
- Check Alerts notify you whenever checks are presented for payment
- CD Alerts notify when your CD is about to mature.
For the credit cards, the option is under the “Account Profile” menu as opposed to under “Tools” where I thought it would be. See screenshot.
Some sites like American Express also have an alert that triggers when it is X days before the bill is due, but they still haven’t received payment, which find most useful. Another alternative would be to just set up auto-pay on the card while it was on e-statements. But if you’re like me, I just switched my Forward card back to paper statements after I got my 5,000 ThankYou points. Sorry, trees!
Posted in Banking, Credit Cards | 24 Comments »
Monday, July 20th, 2009
Here’s a newly released coupon for 25% off real FICO scores at myFico.com. Use the promotional code FICOHELP25 to get 25% off, the best discount currently available:
Update: For the Equifax credit score only, you can get it for $10.95 using the code SW94608. $5 off equates to a little over 30% off.
You enter the promo code relatively late in the buying process, right before entering your credit card information. Look for this:
Experian no longer allows Fair Isaac to sell FICO scores to consumers at all (even though lenders still buy and use them). They sell their own “FAKE-O” version now. Lenders almost always use FICO scores in their decisions, so those are the only ones you should pay for.
For the diligent, a cheaper alternative is to sign up for a free 30-day trial of Scorewatch, which includes two free Equifax scores and reports. Just remember to cancel as soon as you decide you don’t need it anymore. You are allowed to cancel online, without having to even call in.
You can always request your credit reports (not scores) once every 12 months at AnnualCreditReport.com. If you’ve already done that, you can still try these other direct methods for the unemployed, those denied credit, and victims of identity theft.
Posted in Credit Cards | 3 Comments »
Wednesday, July 8th, 2009
If you’re like me, you keep receipts to reconcile with your credit card transactions online. If you dine somewhere you leave a tip, you might be wary that the waitperson might alter your tips, either by accident or on purpose. If you just see the total amount charged and lose your receipt, it’s hard to remember what your tip was. Well, I just noticed on an American Express credit card statement that they actually break down the food and tip charges for your convenience.
I didn’t bother scanning, but it looks just like this:
MOM & POP INDIAN CUISINE $26.44
FOOD/BEVERAGE $22.44
TIP $4.00
A nifty feature, I wonder why others don’t do this as well. However, I am still sticking with the Citi Forward for the 3.5% cash back.
Posted in Credit Cards | 12 Comments »
Friday, July 3rd, 2009
I promised to follow-up on the features of the Citi Forward card after getting mine, and am finally getting around to it. Read on to see how you can get a $100 gift card and also 3.45% cash back with this card at restaurants, Amazon.com, and more.
Sign-Up Bonus
New cardholders get 6,000 bonus ThankYou points after $250 in purchases made within 3 months. In addition, you get another 5,000 points for choosing paperless statements within 3 months.
The 11,000 bonus ThankYou points showed up promptly. I signed up for paperless statements immediately, and received the 5,000 points on my very first statement. I made the required $250 in purchases during the first month (showed up on the first statement), and received the 6,000 points on my second statement.
5x ThankYou Points
This card works off the same ThankYou points system as many other Citibank cards. 10,000 points = $100 gift card at stores like Sears, Macy’s, Staples, Old Navy, Gap, etc. 12,700 points = $100 towards a student loan or mortgage payment. 14,000 points = $100 prepaid Visa credit card. 14,500 points = $100 statement credit.
What makes this card unique is that you get 5 points for every $1 you spend on books, movies, music, and at restaurants. On everything else, you get the plain vanilla 1 reward point for every $1 spent. No annual fee.
5x Rewards at Restaurants
Again, at 1 penny per point with gift cards, getting 5x points is like getting 5% back when eating out. Even if you convert to straight cash, that’s still 3.45% cash back at restaurants (5/1.45). Or 3.57% back if you are okay with prepaid Visa card, which I am since they are usable anywhere that takes credit cards.
I have gotten my 5x rewards at fast food restaurants (McDonald’s), chain sit-down restaurants (Chili’s, etc), and also mom-and-pop places.
5x Rewards at Amazon.com
I can also officially confirm that Amazon.com is considered a bookstore. This is true even if your entire purchase (or any of it) did not contain books. I made one purchase with books, and one with only electronics, and got 5x points for both. So you can indeed get 3.45% cash back at Amazon, or 5% back in the form of gift cards.
The 5x points show up separately under the “Bonus Points by Category Earned” on your online statement:
I can also confirm it works at Regal movie theaters. I have this card stored online at my Amazon account so I don’t forget, and it’s in my wallet marked for restaurants only. Makes it easy to track my dining-out budget!
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 28 Comments »
Monday, June 29th, 2009
I am not a big fan of purchasing credit scores. I can understand why a lender would pay to get a calculation of your likelihood of defaulting on your loan, but if it’s based on our data, why do we have to pay just to see it? Even if I am declined for a loan, I can only see my report, not the numerical score that supposedly defines my financial life.
There are plenty of “fake” credit scores out there, but there is no way to get your real FICO scores anywhere but myFico.com. If you must order your score, use the promotional code CPPSAVINGS to get 20% off all credit report and monitoring services orders. It’s the best coupon I found that worked:
Whenever you do buy a score, I would recommend trying to correlate your score and the current information on your report. Then you can start to learn beyond the generic rules they spit out, and see how changes really affect your score. I’ve applied for 12 credit cards and canceled 5 with almost no affect to my scores - despite all the “rules” - only to have a huge balance on my mom’s credit card (with me as authorized user) show up and drop it by 30 points.
An possibly cheaper alternative is to sign up for a free 30-day trial of Scorewatch, which includes two free Equifax scores and reports. Just remember to cancel as soon as you decide you don’t need it anymore.
* Experian no longer allows Fair Isaac to sell FICO scores to consumers at all (even though lenders still buy and use them). But they’ll happily charge you money for their own attempt at a credit score.
Posted in Credit Cards | 10 Comments »
Thursday, June 25th, 2009
Well, looks like I’ve squeezed all the free money out of another credit card offer. This time it is the Miles Card by Discover. It used to have a good 12-month no-fee 0% balance transfer offer, but has recently added a balance transfer fee. However, it does offer 0% on purchases for 6 months.
In addition, this card still offers a sign-up bonus of 12,000 Miles. You get 1,000 Miles each month you make a purchase for 12 months. A mindless way to get the points is to sign the card up for automatic billing of your cell phone bill (or similar bill).
Discover Miles Redemption Options
However, the Miles you earn with this card are not affiliated with any airline. So what’s one of these special Miles worth? The wording is very vague, and not until you already have the card do you get the details. So here they are…
The most efficient way to redeem is for travel credit. You can redeem 10,000 Miles for a $100 cash credit towards any travel purchase (airfare, hotel, car rental, cruise) from any vendor or website. Now that I’ve actually done the redemption with my Hotwire purchase, I am happy to report that it was hassle-free.
You simply charge the purchase to your card, and request the credit online. The system automatically checks that you have a travel purchase, and approves the request. In a few business days the $100 shows up in your account:
Other redemption options
The alternatives are not that great. If you travel at all, I would wait and go with the travel credit.
- Gift cards. 7,000 Miles gets you $50 gift card at stores such as Macy’s, Gap, or Shell gas stations. You can also redeem 4,000 miles for a $25 gift card.
- Cash. 5,000 Miles gets you $25 deposited into your bank account.
Double Miles & Other Promos
For most purchases, you get 1 Mile per dollar spent. The default feature of the card is that you get 2 Miles per dollar on the first $3,000 in travel and restaurant purchases each year. There is also a rotating category each month. For example, you get double miles on up to $500 in purchases at gas stations throughout June and July.
Even with the double miles here and there, this is not a top rewards card. However, you can still extract $100+ out of it with no annual fee, plus you get 0% interest for 6 months.
Here are additional credit cards with sign-up bonuses of $100 or more.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 8 Comments »
Thursday, May 7th, 2009
Since I can now get 5x ThankYou points on restaurants and Amazon.com purchases from my Citi Forward card, I have been looking into the best way to maximize my redemption value.
The goal is to get as close to making the 5x points equate to 5% cash back by making 100 points = $1. My standard option is to redeem 10,000 points for $100 gift cards to Target and Home Depot, but since the retailer list is getting a bit thinner here are some good alternatives.
Student Loan Rebate Check
Here we can achieve 100 points = $1, but in the form of a check written towards a student loan. From their website:
With the student loan program redemption, Customers can apply their points towards any student loan program -financial institution. Please call 1-800-THANKYOU for details.
You can redeem in increments as small as 2,500 points for a $25 check. You have to call them up, no online redemption. The CSR will ask you for your lender’s name, and they’ll mail you a check written out to your lender (i.e. Citi Student Loans). You are then supposed to add in your account number or whatever else is necessary, and then send it on to your lender. Reader Chris shared that he has a workaround if you lender doesn’t take third-party checks:
I just have the check written out to my bank, Chase, and then write my checking account number in the memo space. I drop it in an ATM and they have always deposited it into my checking account just fine. I’ve been doing this for years with no problem. I would just apply the money myself to my auto-payments and keep my 0.25% rate reduction.
Mortgage Payments
Here we can get up to about 100 points = $0.80. (5x = 4% cash back.) The increments are as low as $25 for 3,300 points, and the ratio gets slightly better with larger check amounts. From the website:
ThankYou Members who redeem will receive a letter with a check issued on behalf of ThankYou Network made out to the financial lending institution to be used towards their monthly mortgage payment. To redeem, members must contact our ThankYou Service Center (1-800-THANKYOU) and must provide the Agent with the name and correct spelling of your mortgage financial lending institution.
Again, you must confirm with your mortgage servicer that they will accept checks from a third-party. I would still prefer to just cash the check and apply it to the mortgage myself.
Expedia Travel Credit
This is another method that we can achieve 100 points = $1 by booking travel directly through the ThankYou/Expedia website. It’s basically Expedia.com, except that the flight costs are shown in ThankYou points. So instead of a $200 flight, it will ask for 20,000 points*.
One benefit of this system is that there are no blackout dates or seat availability issues. If you can find the flight on Expedia.com, you can book it with points. Also, all taxes, fees, and surcharges are included in the point total. In this way, the variable redemption is actually better than the old fixed point option, where the points only covered the base cost of the tickets and you had to pay the taxes and fees separately.
* I just checked this by testing out a SFO-LAS flight on both sites. It was either 12,700 points or $119, which is a little bit off. However, this is because Expedia.com is currently running a promotion until 5/31/09 which waives their booking fees. Otherwise, it should match up almost exactly.
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 9 Comments »
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009
I ended up applying for the Citi Forward card mentioned several days ago as part of my list of credit cards with sign-up incentives. There really wasn’t much to the decision, it was basically the only one I didn’t already have. 
Sign-Up Bonus
New cardholders get 6,000 bonus ThankYou points after $250 in purchases made within 3 months. In addition, you get another 5,000 points for choosing paperless statements within 3 months. As shown below, the 11,000 total points can get you either $100 in gift cards or about $75 towards a prepaid Visa card.
ThankYou Points & Rewards Program Summary
This card works off the same ThankYou points system as many other Citibank cards. 10,000 points = $100 gift card at stores like Sears, Macy’s, Staples, Old Navy, Gap, etc. 14,000 points = $100 prepaid Visa credit card. 16,000 points = $100 in straight cash (a check sent directly to you). If you can find a store where you can use a $100 gift card = 10,000 points, that basically a penny per point.
What makes this card unique is that you get 5 points for every $1 you spend on books, movies, music and at restaurants. On everything else, you get the plain vanilla 1 reward point for every $1 spent. There is no annual fee for the card.
5x Rewards at Restaurants
Again, at 1 penny per point with gift cards, getting 5x points is like getting 5% back when eating out. At that rate, eating out $170 a month will get me a $100 gift card every year. Even if you convert to straight cash, that’s still 3.125% cash back at restaurants (5/1.6). Or 3.57% back if you are okay with prepaid Visa card, which I am since they are usable anywhere that takes credit cards.
5x Rewards on Books = 5% back at Amazon
Here’s an interesting question. Who’s the most popular bookstore? Amazon.com. With the Citi mtvU card for college students, the 5% back on books worked on all purchases at Amazon, even if it wasn’t 100% books, since they really have no way of telling. Update: I have verified 5x points at Amazon.com.
Other features
There is an intro 0% APR on purchases for 6 months. You also get 100 points for each month you paid on time and don’t exceed your credit limit, as well as a highly touted 0.25% interest rate reduction after 3 months in a row of making a purchase, staying within limit and paying on time (max reduction 2%). The APR on this card is only average to begin with, and I don’t carry a balance anyway, so I’m not really concerned with this. The 100 points per month works out to about an additional $12 per year in perks, but I suppose it’s better than nothing.
I’ll keep this in the wallet for the 5x rewards at restaurants and bookstores, while waiting for the Amazon answer. (Things are looking good on this front, but I will probably still make a small test purchase…)
Posted in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 57 Comments »
