Weiss Report Blog

Have you ever imagined how much of your money is literally going waste as interest payments on credit cards? The average family in the United States is knee-deep in debt with a liability of around $7500 as credit card payments. About $1000 is paid as interest each year by the family to the credit card company. If you include a couple of late payments and over the limit charges, the figure gets embarrassingly high.

Nearly three out of five U.S. households are accountable for the approximately $560 billion in outstanding credit card debt. The total consumer debt including credit card payments and home mortgages are around 6.8 trillion beating the total US national debt, which is around 5.9 trillion. There has been a noticeable decline in the US personal savings rate from 8% in the 1980s to less than zero in present times. There is a colossal increase in credit card debt which has increased by 400 billion dollars in the past decade to an embarrassing figure of $700 billion.

If you have more than one credit card payment to make with a high interest, you can transfer you balance to another credit where you pay zero or less interest. Do this only if you intend to pay the balance in full within the introductory period of the balance transfer. You can also move your balance from a card with a high APR to the one with the low APR. Make sure that you pay the amount in full as you already have to pay less money towards interest.

Make a list of all your credit card debts and the amounts owed on each card every month. Pay off the card with the lowest amount first. Then use that money to pay of the second lowest amount. Alternatively, you can pay off the credit which has the highest rate of interest first and then move down progressively to pay the credit cards with lower rates of interest. This way, you save a lot of money on interest payments.

The best advice, however to get out of your credit card debt and improve your personal savings rate is to stop using your credit cards and use them only in important or emergency occasions. Use the credit card with the lowest interest rate, if you have many credit cards, and put the rest through your shredder. Using the card wisely is the best step to personal money management in a country like the US which dwells in a lifestyle of credit card usage.

Daniel Cohen recommends Find Credit Cards for comparing different Citibank credit card applications.

Travelers are very familiar with the frequent flyer credit card. It is a credit card that is issued by a card company, in collaboration with a major airline, or issued by the airline itself, to allow a person to avail of the airline’s services, yet pay for it at a later date.

Businessmen are the usual people who avail of this kind of card since they always travel to take care of work related matters in various places and with various clients. So that the frequent flyer credit card would be fully used, the issuing company gives incentives like free travels or free stays at a certain hotel if a cardholder accumulates a certain number of miles. But how can a frequent flyer cardholder get the mileage points quickly?

1) Use hotels and car rentals - airline-specific cards, or flyer cards that are tied to a certain airline, are often also connected to certain hotels and car rental services as a form of advertising and patronage strategy.

If a cardholder checks-in a hotel that is part of the card’s mileage point accumulation scheme, he should put the hotel charges on the credit card. As much as possible, if there is an available car rental service that is tied up with the frequent flyer card, charge the rental fees to the card. These will help the holder rack up a hefty amount of points per travel.

2) Avail of vacation or tour packages - those typical 2-day, 3-night stays at a certain resort, vacation spot, or country help an airline-specific cardholder accumulate more mileage points for his frequent flyer card.

It sure is a great thing to enjoy yourself in an exotic location, eat great food, experience the locality’s culture, and when you get home, be assured that you didn’t just spend money. Your vacation is earning you some points that will give you better and maybe free vacations in the future! Now you have a good reason to keep on traveling and going on vacations.

3) Charge travel related expenses to your frequent flyer card - if you don’t travel that often, or just travel during certain times of the year, it also helps to rack up points by putting your expenses during your travel on the credit card. If you bought some souvenirs, charge it to the card. If the car ran out of gas, just refill the gas tank and pay for it using your credit card. Bought, some groceries, charge it to the credit card. These will help you accumulate mileage points for your frequent flyer card.

4) Travel as often as possible - Most businessmen and executives can avail of the benefits of a frequent flyer credit card since they always travel. Business meetings here, conferences in the next state, branch visits in another state, working out deals overseas, and a lot more help the busy executive rack up mileage points that will soon translate to free plane tickets, or free stays in a hotel, or any other benefits that a frequent flyer card offers to its cardholder.

If you can frequently travel, keep on traveling! Just charge all your plane tickets to your frequent flyer card. This will help you accumulate more than twenty thousand (20,000) miles in a year! Now that’s a sound deal to payoff all the hard work you have done for the company!

So what are you waiting for? If you have the time, money, and reasons to go somewhere via the airplane, book a ticket and start traveling! You’ll be glad you brought out the traveler in you!

Morgan Hamilton offers expert advice and great tips regarding all aspects concerning Credit Cards. Get the information you are seeking now by visiting
Best Airline Miles Credit Cards

One of the more frustrating things of being a student is not having an income to qualify for a credit card. Especially at those times when you are traveling or shopping, you have no choice but to bring a wad of cash around. What’s more, without a credit card, you can’t enjoy the reward programs and claim for household items, shopping vouchers or even airline miles.

Credit card companies have realized the convenience of credit cards to students and therefore have come up with Student Credit Cards. Of course, without an income or a credit history, applicants of these credit cards have to rely on their parent’s consent in order to qualify for a credit limit. As having and using a student credit card requires a certain level or responsibility, it is best that you evaluate the following facts on student credit cards before you apply for one.

Easy money, easy debt

Many students and parents aim to utilize student credit cards to build a credit profile, but lack the foresight to see that this is actually a double-edged sword. Inexperienced with managing their finances, clouded by 0% APR and enticing reward programs, many students have fallen into the debt trap through their student credit cards. This leads to heavy debt and financial difficulties well before they even graduate.

Read the fine print

If there’s one thing common on student naivety, it is their failure to read the fine print on the terms and conditions of getting a credit card. This leads to ignorance of the introductory period for the 0% APR and the high interest rates thereafter. As it is so easy to get these credit cards and convenient to spend with them, many students fall into heavy debt once the 0% APR period is over.

How to choose a credit card

Credit card companies are getting more aggressive in their marketing initiatives that students often have a tough time making up their minds on the card of their choice. One of the best ways to evaluate a card is to obtain peer recommendations on their experience in using the cards.

Learn to manage your finances

Student credit cards provide students with an opportunity to manage their finances well before they graduate. They will need to ensure that they pay their outstanding balances on time, as well as to keep track of their allowances and expenditure.

Build a good credit history

It is a known fact that without a credit history, college graduates will have to make do with the inconvenience of not having a credit card when they are employed. Thus, in order to make things easier for the future, you need to ensure that credit card debt is well-managed to build a good credit record for easier approval on your future loan applications.