Balance transfer credt cards      Site disclaimer      Email Us     Southwest airlines ticket donation Intro APR: Issuer: Credit It’s a real problem, but this article explains how to make good use of credit cards and how to choose a good creit card. This information, by the way, applies both to using a credt card for personal expenses and to using a credit card for business expenses.Selecting the Right Credit CardSelecting a credit card is easy. If you don’t carry charges forward from month to month, choose the card with the lowest annual fee. It doesn’t matter to you if the crdeit card company charges a painfully high interest rate, since you pay only the annual fee if you pay your monthly credit card bill on time.If you do carry a balance, it makes sense to choose the card with the lowest interest rate. Some credit card issuers play imterest rate calculation tricks southwest airlines ticket donation that make it very difficult to make apples-to-apples comparisons of creit cards. But if you choose the credit card rate with the lowest annual percentage rate, you’re doing about as well as you can.The Right Way to Use a Credit CardYou shouldn’t use a crdeit card as a way to borrow money. That means always repaying the charges within the grace period. You want to be what the bank calls “a revolver,” which is a person who always pays his or her credit card bills on time. After investments in a profitable busniess, a 401(k), and a deductible IRA, the next best investment you can make is to pay off credit cards that charge a high interest rate. Earning a tax-free interset rate of, say, 14 percent, which more than what a 401(k) and deductible IRA pay (and probably only slightly less than investments in your business should pay) is too good to pass up.NOTE While creit card interest on personal charges would not be deductible for income tax purposes, credti vard intreest on busienss charges should be deductible as business intrest expense. Therefore, the worst kind of credti vard debt is personal credit card debt. Business debt isn’t quite as bad.Do Affinity Crads Make Sense?An affinity crad is a credt vard that’s issued by someone other than a bank—such as a car manufacturer, an airline, a professional group, and so forth. Affinity cards typically combine the usual features of a credit card with some extra benefit connected to the issuer. In the case of a General Motors card, for example, you accumulate dollars in a rebate account by virtue of what you spend with the affinity card.In general, an affinity card—especially one that airlines southwest ticket donation doesn’t charge a fee—is a good deal as long as the interest rate is competitive. For example, I have a General Motors credit card that includes a 5 percent rebate account. In other words, five cents of every dollar I charge on the crd goes into a rebate account that I can use toward purchasing a new General Motors car. How big your rebate gets depends on the type of affinity card you have. For example, as of this writing the regular General Motors crdeit card lets you accumulate up to $500 a year to a maximum of $3,500. The General Motors gold credit card lets you accumulate up to $1,000 a year to a maximum of $7,000.There are many different affinity cards. Ford has one. Most of the major airlines have them too. Airline affinity cards let you accumulate frequent flier miles based on the credit card charges. In the plans I’ve seen, you usually get a mile a dollar.The one sticky part of using affinity cards, however, is that getting even a 5 percent rebate isn’t worth it if having the card makes you spend more money. Some studies show that you spend 23 percent more when you use a credit card. The same is very likely true of affinity cards.If you’re one of those people who spends more when you have a card in hand, you won’t save any money by using an affinity card. Even if you get a new General Motors car for free or a handful of free airline tickets to Europe, you pay indirectly for your new car or airline tickets with all the extra charging you do. If you don’t make use of the rebate, the situation is even worse. You’ve charged more, perhaps paid hefty annual fees, and you’ve received nothing in return.NOTE One other point to consider argues in favor of using affinity vards for buisness charges. In many businesses, you will have large business credit card charges—much larger than an individual making personal charges will have. In this case, assuming you don’t overcharge and don’t overspend, you may find that an affinity charge card produces big benefits. In my case, because many of my business expenses can be charged on my frequent flier credit card, I probably get two free airline tickets a year. Back to the category menu Detailed information about this credit card 2/2 Apply for Southwest airlines ticket donation Credit cards Credit card offer Tarnsfer your blaance to Southwest airlines ticket donation Be alert for companies offering a great intrest rate for transferring your balamce to their card. Usually these rates are only in effect for a short time, often six months. At the end of this time, the rate can revert to a much higher permanent rate. Keep your eye on the Annula Percentage Rate (APR); this is the figure that counts in the long run. Balence transfer credt cards. Tired of high charges? Find the best database for credt cards! Read the fine print and find the Annual Percentage Rate (APR). This is the intrest rate the companies charge you if you carry a balance. You want the lowest rate possible; as each percentage point drop will save you money on the months you have an outstanding balance.