Well, looks like Chase has just made my shit list on a more-or-less permanent basis.
So, time to hunt down another credit card. I have great credit and will only use the card for quickly-reimbursed work expense report-related purchases. Since I’ll be charging a decent amount, I’d like to squeeze out what I can for putting my money on the line in case of employer-employee screwage.
So, I try out sites like bankrate.com and creditcardguide.com and take a look around. Pretty easy to use sites, and it’s all very nice, but I must be missing something somewhere. There are all sorts of entries that will tell you really helpful things like, “Ten bajillion yer-awesome-points for every dollar spent at a circus on a Tuesday”, but I can’t for the life of me figure out how many yer-awesome-points I need to get myself that shiny new egg cup I’ve been dreaming about.
Where can I find a cash value (or merchandise value, in the case of my egg cup) for these points?
-Joe
Don’t hold your breath on this one. An article in yesterday’s NY Times told how the credit card would no longer be able to gouge the slow payers they would now go after the people who pay their bill every month (their term for such people is, I kid you not, “deadbeats”). They will attempt to do this by canceling no-fee cards, getting rid of cash-backs and, worst of all, start charging interest from the day of the purchase.
Back to the cash economy for me. Too bad; it was great while it lasted. The only thing is that right now, with interest rates so low, it will pay me to maintain a credit balance for the few purchases (e.g. airline tickets and car rentals) that cannot be done without a credit card.
Of course, they are only talking about this right now. Maybe competition will prevent some of it.
While I certainly won’t declare it “the best” for everyone, this works really good for me.
It’s the Amex card I got through Costco.
I pay it off every month, so I really don’t know what the interest rate is. Maybe 10%. Maybe. I didn’t really care about the interest since I was going to always pay it off.
It gives me at least 1% cash back on ‘everything’. 2% cash back on ‘travel’ (I think it is travel that is the 2%) and 3% cash back on gasoline. They settle up once per year. And you can get it in cash, not just Costco credit. They tell you on every monthly statement how much cash you’ve earned. I think the limit is something like $500. I like the plain English of cash back instead of some “reward” where you have no idea how much it is really worth.
I also have/had a Bank of America card, and even though I pay much more than minimum (alas, I do carry a balance there) I’ve been informed that they will be raising my interest rate from 7% to just under 11%. I auto-pay everything, so they are indeed sticking it to me, since I’ve never had any late payments. After I finish paying this off, they are not likely to ever get my business again.:mad:
I really doubt that all that will come to pass.
Particularly, I doubt that they’ll start charging from the day of purchase or completely getting rid of cash-back cards. The credit card companies still make money from people who don’t get charged extra fees by virtue of merchant fees, and making credit cards cost more and start charging interest immediately would lead them to being pretty-well swallowed up by debit cards.
I’m a fan of my Schwab Vias. 2% back on everything, deposited monthly into a Schwab brokerage account (that I had to set up with the card). Of course, there’s no requirement to actually use the brokerage’s services.
I have a Chase Starbucks and as long as I pay it off I get free Starbucks coffee. Amex will give you miles. If your company reimburses you fast, it doesn’t matter. Starwood Hotels has a AMEX plan where you get one Starwood Point and that can be changed for one Airline Point for each Starwood Plan.
It does seem unlikely that CC companies will do something like charge interest from the first day when they are competing against free as in cash. I strongly suspect those stories were planted scaremongering in an attempt to stop the new CC law. Obviously no one paid any attention. And if they did, I suspect congress would mandate a grace period.
Like others here, I don’t know nor care what the interest rate is on my credit cards. X% of zero is a reasonable number to me. 
I don’t mind being called deadbeat by the CC companies. Compared to what I call them, it is a compliment!