Taking advantage of credit card giveaways
You get things for nothing rarely in life, and cash back from retailers or from credit cards companies may or may not be considered as your free lunches. Still, if you have the chance to take free offers without spending more money to do so, it would be very foolish not to.
A number of credit cards are now providing a rebate equaling one percent of your entire purchases toward the Section 529 plan. The plan may be only one of other incentives that your credit card company often offers, like double warranties, air miles, rental car insurance, and travel insurance. Others may offer you a percentage of each transaction or known as cash back, or your credit card company may even deposit the amount difference into your savings account, in cents.
For example, your cash back amount can be the next higher dollar subtracted with your transaction amount. So, if you charge $45.25 for a dinner, your credit card company will give you $0.75.
If you can’t handle your credit cards efficiently, these offers can be ones you should avoid. Any fees or interest your credit card company charges you will swallow up any incentives your credit card company is offering. On the flip side, if you still want to use your credit card anyway, you should consider changing to other card company to avail yourself of any particularly attractive offers. Doing so doesn’t put your child through college, or allow you to retire young; however, every cent that someone else sends into your savings account is one less cent you need to find.
Some credit card companies offer additional warranty time or coverage on merchandises that you buy using their credit card. The extra coverage is only offered on particular credit cards, usually the Premium credit cards. If any product that you buy using that credit cards are stolen, lost or breaks, your credit card will be replaced free of charge.
In an interesting twist on a credit card theme, BabyMint and Upromise have formulated a clever scheme by which they can sign up retailers, restaurants, manufacturers, and other service providers who will gift a part of your expenses into a general account established by BabyMint or Upromise. You have the chance to invest your funds in those accounts in the Section 529 plan. For instance, a nationwide gasoline company may give you one cent for each gallon, a major department store chain may give 1.5 percent of your entire purchases, and the incentive on a new home or car could be in the hundreds or even thousands.
Granted, those incentives are all tiny amounts by themselves, however just as your insignificant weekly interest of your savings account add up slowly, so do these. Depending on the number of the related products and stores you use and the amount of money you spend, your profits here could be significant after a decade or two.
tags: advantage, credit card, giveaway
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