Tag Archives: themselves
Cash Back Credit Cards – Solutions With "Catches" (Page 1 of 2)
Cash back credit cards are now being made available in a variety of new options. However, it is important for consumers not to skip over the process of researching all details of a card before applying. Cash back credit cards, although useful credit card solutions, also frequently carry with them several “catches” (targeted reward categories, high credit necessary to apply, potentially capped rewards) that consumers need to inform themselves about in order to maximize their effective use of the cards.
In a world of rising gas prices and falling employee compensation, it’s more true than ever that a small amount of cash can go a very long way. This, at least, is the logic behind the variety of new cash back credit cards that now flood the market from many major providers. These cards offer a number of different cash back plans for several types of purchases: cash back for retirement, for charity, for affiliate products. All are designed, at least in part, to encourage credit card use by returning some percentage of the purchase price to the consumer at the end of the year. It sounds like–and can be–a good deal, the literal truth of the classic adage “spend money to make money.”
But in addition to the good deal, cash back credit cards carry with them hidden hooks and lines. The card application always lists these plainly, but customers who just want to cash in on the promise of quick percentage rewards can often overlook the most crucial caveats of all. More savvy customers, however, should ask themselves maybe the most important question anyone can ask when considering a new credit card: what’s the catch?
The first catch is that the high-end cash back rewards don’t usually apply to entertainment, housing, or luxury items. Since these make up a large portion of most people’s paychecks, anyone who believes that a hypothetical 5% cash back guarantee will apply to everything purchased with that cash back credit card will be in for a rude surprise. The higher fees are typically targeted toward fundamental goods in our society: supermarket purchases, drugstore runs, gasoline. Most of the best cash back credit cards offer a flat 1% fee on other purchases, which can be substantial by the end of a year, but still possibly not what the customer who only glanced through the brochure expects.
Another big catch is the high credit rating necessary to get one’s hands on any of the best cash back credit cards. The most popular cards all require at least a good credit rating, with many asking for excellent. The effect of this is to push the target market of typical cash back credit card consumers toward two groups: first-time credit card applicants and the very financially prudent. And it is a nice bonus for people with good credit (or at least no bad credit) to be able to earn typically 1% of the purchase of price back on most goods, but for anyone in dire financial straits looking to put together some extra money through cash back rewards, it would be wise to look elsewhere.
Payday Loans At War?
If you were perhaps of a more cynical nature, and were looking for an ideal target market for your payday loans business, how would this scenario sound to you?
How about people working in a business where the paychecks are absolutely guaranteed to come in on time each and every month, no matter what?
A business with a large, relatively immobile workforce, who tend to stay in one place for predetermined periods of time, and who will, moreover, have plenty of notice that will move, should that happen.
A business whose workforce is overwhelmingly comprised of young, who are perhaps not too worldly wise, and who are used to doing what they are told to do, when they are old to do it.
I guess that, were you that somewhat cynical payday loan company owner, this would sound pretty good to you, right? Perhaps that is why most military bases in the USA are now almost surrounded by payday loan outlets.
At a time when ever increasing military demands are being made of young army and navy personnel by the continuing Iraq conflict, Senior Military Officers are increasingly concerned about the additional stresses on the servicemen and women caused by the prevalence of outstanding payday loans.
Whilst the payday loan companies themselves deny that they specifically target military personnel, it is hard to actually believe that to be the case, simply from looking at the concentration of payday loan outlets near most military bases.
Stories of both Army and Navy officers falling prey to such lenders are fairly easy to come by, and of course, the last thing that such soldiers, sailors and officers need at a time of war are the additional stresses placed on them by increasing debts.
In fact, the problem has now got so bad that many military bases are running training courses in responsible personal financial management, a key module of which is teaching the younger servicemen and women about payday loans.
In particular, these courses are designed to teach the students how it is probably best to avoid payday loans completely if at all possible, or, if not, how to deal with them responsibly.
Of course, this cannot get away from the fact that military personnel are no different to anyone else, and they will have times of cash flow problems, just the same as their none military counterparts.
And this is equally not saying that payday loans are of themselves a bad thing. Anyone who has used such a loan to dig themselves out of a hole will probably have no problems with payday loans, on one proviso. That is, that they paid it back in time!
Unfortunately, whether the payday loans companies concur or not, there does seem reasonable empirical evidence to suggest that perhaps they are unusually willing to extend such loans to military personnel.
Personnel whose very existence depends on them being able to concentrate 100% on the task in hand, who, perhaps morally, should not be placed under any additional external pressures.
The fact is that payday loans for military personnel are big business, and they do serve a real purpose for the beneficiaries of such loans.
However, there can be no denying that military personnel are not like other people who take payday loans, and it is good to see that the powers that be have taken this on board, and are attempting to deal with it through additional training and education.