Credit Card Solution

Seems like daily there are news reports concerning yet another case of identity theft or credit card fraud. Who are the typical victims? Are they the nice elderly couple down the street who are so trusting and big-hearted? Or perhaps the high school and college-age kids who believe they are invincible as they step out to conquer the world and make a place for themselves? Surely it isn’t the savvy white-collar business man who drives his Lexus by the house everyday on his way to work.

The truth is, none of us is exempt from the all-too-real threat of potential credit card fraud, which is a big part of identity theft. In reality, no one can guarantee that your credit card numbers won’t be stolen or that your identity won’t be accessed by a criminal. However, there are several pro-active measures we can take that will reduce our risk ratio.

I have a friend who is a general contractor. He ha

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Now everyone wants the best rewards from their credit card don’t they?  But sadly many people still opt for the first card to accept them when they apply.  This can result in them getting very good rewards, but they may be rewards that the cardholder doesn’t need and will never use, like airmiles perhaps or money of wine and CDs…

There are some pretty good reward cards out there however, and we’re going to tell you about a few of them on offer at the moment.  One of the top ones at the moment appears to be the American Express Platinum card.  With this card you can expect the following benefits:

• Up to 5% cashback.  Now there isn’t a much better reward than that is there?  Cash back from your credit card allows you to spend the money on what you want rather than what the credit card company would rather you spend your money on like wine and CDs as Virgin would have you do.
• No annual fee
• 19.9% interest rate.  This isn’t great but then for a credit card as good as an American Express if you can afford to get one you can afford the interest believe me.
• Purchase protection insurance.  Always a good thing.
• Discounts on shopping, dining and entertainment too.

If that isn’t enough for you then you’re not easily satisfied.  However, if you want to get your hands on a new shiny Amex card you’re going to have to have at least a cool £30,000 a year coming into your household.

Credit Card Rewards: Reverse Robin Hood?

Robin Hood used to steal from the rich in order to give to the poor. Now a public policy discussion paper from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston gets close to suggesting that credit card rewards programs achieve much the same–except in reverse.

The paper, published last Wednesday, says: “On average, each cash-using household pays $151 to card-using households and each card-using household receives $1,482 from cash users every year.” And it goes on to show that it’s low-income households that tend to use cash and high-income families who receive most through using their credit cards.

Credit Card Companies and Swipe Fees

The Fed’s hypothesis is based on how “interchange fees” (also known as “merchant fees” and “swipe fees”) are levied and funded. These interchange fee

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