MyCardBlog

This is a guest post from Tom.

Tom Tessin runs a getting out of debt blog, as well as a prepaid credit cards list based site. Feel free to subscribe to his RSS feed at http://www.findsecuredcards.com/blog/rss.

If you’re like me, and you like to control your budget, I wanted to show you why you should consider a prepaid credit card for your wallet. If you’re into rewards, and capitalizing on credit cards, then this might not be the type of card for you. Honestly, it’s built for those that want to either get out of debt, or know how much they are spending each, and every month.

What is a prepaid credit card?

A prepaid credit card will remind you a lot like a gift card. You’ll tie your bank account up with your card, and every time you want to load your card, you will log into your account, and send money to your card. The cool thing about most cards is that you’re able to set up daily, weekly, or monthly instant transactions, so that it automatically loads your card.

4 things you should look for in a prepaid card

The fees: A lot of these prepaid cards have fees. NEVER get one in a grocery store, or place like CVS. They rip you off in fees alone. Instead, look for a card online that allows you to bypass the fees. Most will make you link your bank account, in order to bypass the fees.

Major logo: Every card should have a major logo that you apply for. Since you want it to be credible, you’ll want to make sure it comes from an issuer such as Visa, MasterCard, etc. It never hurts to do a little research on the bank as well.

Get rewards: Yes, you can get rewards with your prepaid card! Some banks will give you interest on your deposit, while others will give you points for every dollar spent. It you can capitalize on the rewards, and then you’ll really make out.

Review it: The last thing that you’ll want to do is review the card online. How do you do this? Just Google the name, and see what other people think. By doing this, you’ll get a fairly good vibe on how the card is. If you get a bad vibe, find another, since there are so many on the market.

This is really all there’s to it in finding a card. Get a card with no fees, rewards, and from a legitimate bank, and you’ll be all set.

Today most retailers have their own brand credit cards (which you can use everywhere with VISA, MasterCard, or American Express logo) or store cards (which you can only use at specific stores). I was interested in this kind of credit cards now and will introduce some of them in the following posts. The NO. 1 card that I want to introduce here is the Sears Card including Sears Card and Sears MasterCard issued with Citi.

Sears Card

This is a general store issued card which can only be used at Sears stores, K Mart stores, Sears.com and Kmart.com. Sears often offer special discount to Sears Cardholders (5%~30% off by chance). One very important feature I want to mention here is the free monthly credit score access for this Sears Cardholders. It is interesting that they have a website to describe this promotion at http://www.searsscore.com/. This credit score access is counted as soft pull which does not influence your credit score. So if you want to monitor your credit score, you would like to consider this card.

Other features of this card:

• No annual fee
• Returns without a receipt
• Exclusive cardmember-only sales throughout the year with big savings on Kenmore^TM appliances, washers, dryers, Craftsman^® tools and electronics
• Frequent short-term special financing offers

Read more…

I introduced the Add It Up program from Bank of America early this year. It seems that not many of my readers are interested in this program including myself. I usually us ebates.com or mrrebates.com to earn cash back. Now I found that actually Add It Up will offer huge cash back for certain merchants when they run promotions. So I think it is necessary to point it out and let all of you guys know this.

Enroll in Add It Up is very simple. Login your online account at Bank of America and then at the Customer Service section you can find the link to Add It Up program. All you have to do is to provide email address to let BOA to contact you regarding cash back and choose the accounts (some or all) to enroll in this program (banking accounts or credit cards accounts are qualified). Finally, you want to choose the account that the cash back will be deposited to either credit card or checking account will be OK). Now you are ready to earn cash back by shopping online through Add It Up!

The Key is how much they will reward you for shopping through Add It Up. Now I have some popular merchants for your reference.

• Sears.com 6%
• BestBuy.com 3%
• Staples.com 4%
• Target.com 8%
• WalMart.com 4%
• Apple Store 4%

They can be found at the Limited Time Offer section in the program page.

After you click the merchant to shop, Add It Up will once again to confirm that you are going to enter the merchant’s page. SO the cash back will not be lost because you are always asked to get the permission to go to the merchant’s website.

The limited time offers change all the time. So before you place the order via other cash back websites, it is a good habit to check current rate at Add It Up to earn more cash back.

Some of you may ask “How long does it take to get my cash back rewards?”

Answer: It can take up to 90-120 days for cash back awards to be credited to your account. Why? Participating retailers must first confirm your purchase and typically they have up to 90 days from the purchase date to reverse a transaction for return purposes. During this time, your award will have a Pending status on the My Awards page.

But please note that Washington and Idaho BOA customers are not eligible for this program .

I just introduced the BankAmericard Cash Rewards Visa Signature Card from Bank of America yesterday. And many readers sent inquires about other possible huge promotions. $75 bonus seems to be not so attractive to many. Well, then the Premier Rewards Gold Card from American Express might excite you! The main reason is that this credit card is offering 15000 bonus sign up points now with first year fee-free!

This 15000 bonus rewards points can be redeemed as a $150 gift card which doubles the earning compared to the BankAmericard Cash Rewards Visa Signature Card. Please remember that you have to spend over $1000 to get the 15000 bonus points.

Overall features of this Premier Rewards Gold Card from American Express:

• Earn 15,000 Membership Rewards® bonus points when you spend $1,000 in your first 3 months of Card membership – redeemable for up to $150 in gift Cards upon point credit at participating retail, dining, and entertainment partners.
• Earn Membership Rewards® points up to three times as fast: You can earn 3X points on airfare, 2X points on gas and groceries, and 1X points on everything else.
• No annual fee for your first year of membership, then $175.
• Earn 15,000 Membership Rewards bonus points when you spend $30,000 per calendar year.
• Gold Card Events: Access to Preferred Seating, pre-sale tickets, and more.

My point is to sign up this credit card and spend $1000 in 3 months and then cancel it any time before the next year. (Secret: When you call to cancel it, American Express will probably give you 10000 bonus points!)

Chase just sent me a mail regarding the new rewards program for Chase Freedom Card with Chase Exclusive. I’m sad to tell you that the rewards for this Chase Freedom Card is getting worse. BUT, Chase gives the new rewards program a better name-Chase Ultimate Rewards.

Previously, Chase exclusive (people who have a checking account at Chase) for Chase Freedom Card members can get 3% cashback from 6 different categories each month. Now, you can get 1 point for $1 spent plus 10% bonus points (minimum $10 to start getting bonus points). If you are a Chase exclusive member, you can get 10 bonus points for each transaction. If you are not a Chase exclusive member, sorry, all you can get is 1 point plus 10% bonus points.

Let’s do the math:

Previous Chase Freedom Card: $100 can give you $3 cashback which is equal to 300 points.

Current Chase Freedom Card: $100 can give you 100+10+100 (maximum, assume $10 each transaction)=210 points.

The 210 points are based on the assumption that you use 10 transactions with $10 each, and 210 points are the maximum bonus you can get.

More information about the new Ultimate Rewards program can be found at chase.com/tour.

Today a MyCardBlog.com reader sent me an email about this interesting but sounds possible information from Bank of America. The key point is you can really make a huge profit from Bank of America if you are a student and have a credit card issued by Bank of America. Although I provide this information to you, I have to clarify that this has not been confirmed since the original source seems to be a phone marketing.

The prerequisite is 1). You have a Bank of America credit card which enables you enroll the credit protection plan

2). You must have to enroll in the Credit protection deluxe plan (not the general plus plan)

3). You must can meet the requirement set by Bank of America thus you can activate the benefit

SO how can you get the $1000 from Bank of America? Here is the details:

The principal of this promotion is you get $500 from Bank of America for enrolling the credit protection deluxe plan and activate the benefit like you do for other credit protection plans. But you can only activate benefit twice each year.

If you enrolled in the Bank of America credit protection deluxe plan with your Bank of America credit card, and meet one of the following requirements (lief benefits):

1. Academic Excellance – a 3.6 gpa or higher for the term, not cumulative GPA, term GPA.
2. Graduating – Getting a degree .
3. Entering school – Becoming a full time student.

You can call Bank of America to activate the benefit to get $500. They will send you an envelop and clearly list the materials needed to activate your benefit. Since you can do this twice each year, you potential return is $1000 from Bank of America. The net profit is about $760 because the cost for enrolling the Deluxe plan is $20 each month. (The cost of the general credit protection plus plan is 95¢ per $100 of Your Monthly Outstanding Balance up to $25,000.)

For more information you can contact the Plan Administrator toll free at 1.888.668.6938 Monday-Friday, 7:00 a.m. – 10:00 p.m. Central Time. The webpage for the credit protection plan is here.

The Citi Professional Card used to be a very popular credit card which offers 15,000 bonus thankyou points after approval. Now this credit card no longer offers 15,000 bonus points. Today after a little bit search on the internet (via Google), I discovered a link pointed to the Citi Professional Card application which offers 15,000 bonus thankyou points.

The link to the application page is here. You go through the normal application procedures and wait for the approval. Please make sure you save the application page with bonus information. (I can not guarantee that Citi will honor this bonus but it is worth trying.) You have to make a purchase to get the bonus. According to the application page, you can also get 0% APR on balance transfer for 12 months.

The 15,000 thankyou points can be redeemed at thankyou.com ($135 gift card).

This is a credit card tip but not credit card news (not official).