Credit Card Discussion

raccoon · 2019-11-23T15:11:01.000Z

I did a Google search for credit cards that offer price protection, and I'm giving up on that feature.

I'll just consider a low fixed APR with no annual fee.

I can find some under 10%.

They have no perks, but I'm okay with that.

EDIT:

I applied for a credit card here:

https://www.pointwestcu.com/personal/credit-cards/

pennzy · 2019-11-23T15:19:20.000Z

The CC competition is apparently fierce right know if your credit score is good. I am constantly getting offers to open accounts and receive $150 or $200 statement credit. Hard to pass on free money. These are 0 annual fee reward cards. Then they bombard you with special rewards. Right know, Shop Your Way Mastercard ( previously Sears) is offering 20% back between Oct. 1st-Dec.31st on groceries and gas. Put all your grocery and gas purchases on the card and pay it off every month. Free money. I’m still waiting for the pre recession 0 transaction fee, 0 % interest loans to come back. I took one of them out, deposited the money in a 5% Orange Savings account for 3 years, then paid back the loan at the end of 0% 3 year period. Free money.

raccoon · 2019-11-25T13:18:03.000Z

raccoon city:

Because it's a MasterCard, I can supposedly do up to 4 Price Protection claims per 12 months, but I just called them and they will not be open until Monday.

I just got off the phone with MasterCard.

It was quite an ordeal, as I could not understand the woman on the phone very well, and she could not understand me very well, and I couldn't talk to anyone else.

My credit card does not have Price Protection.

I think I'll be much happier once I have a new credit card from somewhere else.

pennzy · 2019-11-25T13:25:52.000Z

While we are on the subject of CCs, has the Equifax breach affected anyone concerning cards being hacked? Mine are being hacked regularly. Just wondering if it is just mine.

Yourrid · 2019-11-26T03:42:32.000Z

pennzy:

While we are on the subject of CCs, has the Equifax breach affected anyone concerning cards being hacked? Mine are being hacked regularly. Just wondering if it is just mine.

I’ve had it happen a couple times. Actually got a Macy’s credit card in the mail which I had no knowledge of. I did my research and found out you can indefinitely freeze all 3 of your credit reports for free. Locked mine as well as my wife’s credit reports down. Any time I want to apply for a new card, I unlock 1 of my reports 24 hours before and refreeze it immediately after.

Haven’t had an issue since.

pennzy · 2019-11-26T13:46:34.000Z

Yourrid:

pennzy:

While we are on the subject of CCs, has the Equifax breach affected anyone concerning cards being hacked? Mine are being hacked regularly. Just wondering if it is just mine.

I’ve had it happen a couple times. Actually got a Macy’s credit card in the mail which I had no knowledge of. I did my research and found out you can indefinitely freeze all 3 of your credit reports for free. Locked mine as well as my wife’s credit reports down. Any time I want to apply for a new card, I unlock 1 of my reports 24 hours before and refreeze it immediately after.

Haven’t had an issue since.

I should do the same thing but then all the offers would stop, right? Is it free to unlock/lock for 24 hours?

Freezing will stop new accounts from being opened. The trouble I’m having is that my existing accounts are being hacked one by one. Thank you Equifax.

raccoon · 2019-12-01T01:34:03.000Z

raccoon city:

I applied for a credit card here:

https://www.pointwestcu.com/personal/credit-cards/

I didn't get that credit card, so I applied for one here:

https://www.ghpfcu.org/visa-credit-cards

Yourrid · 2019-12-02T00:48:56.000Z

pennzy:

Yourrid:

pennzy:

While we are on the subject of CCs, has the Equifax breach affected anyone concerning cards being hacked? Mine are being hacked regularly. Just wondering if it is just mine.

I’ve had it happen a couple times. Actually got a Macy’s credit card in the mail which I had no knowledge of. I did my research and found out you can indefinitely freeze all 3 of your credit reports for free. Locked mine as well as my wife’s credit reports down. Any time I want to apply for a new card, I unlock 1 of my reports 24 hours before and refreeze it immediately after.

Haven’t had an issue since.

I should do the same thing but then all the offers would stop, right? Is it free to unlock/lock for 24 hours?

Freezing will stop new accounts from being opened. The trouble I’m having is that my existing accounts are being hacked one by one. Thank you Equifax.

Yea I think the offers stop coming when you have your credit frozen. Although all of my banks are still able to update my score every month.

With the massive Equifax breach last year, I will NEVER have unfrozen credit unless I’m ready to apply for a line of credit somewhere. It is 100% free and backed by laws requiring the credit companies to not allow any new lines of credit. Why anyone would pay for services like LifeLock is beyond me.

If any of your 3 credit scores are unfrozen, check out which credit card companies are offering you bonuses for signing up. https://www.creditcards.com/cardmatch/

klrman · 2019-12-02T03:05:28.000Z

I like Chase personally as they let you build up debt and then pay it off for you with no strings attached!

https://www.nbcnews.com/business/consumer/chase-cancelling-its-canadian-customers-credit-card-debt-n1041036

cpf_borealis · 2019-12-02T23:47:34.000Z

bushmaster:

Citibank Costco Visa card. 4% on gas, 3% travel and dining, 2% on everything at Costco, 1 % on everything else. Very good card IF you are a Costco member. Benefits come as a Costco rebate to be spent there. If you are a Costco shopper, you already know that isn’t hard to do.

You don’t have to spend the rebate at Costco, you can get cash at a register or at the service desk for high amounts.

nquinn:

The most valuable credit cards are those that issue airline points, but you have to play the game properly.

This is debatable. The most valuable part of airline credit cards is the signup bonus. After the signup bonus you can’t get much value from the points received for regular spending. For most people, especially those who don’t travel first/business class, a straight up 2% cash back credit card would work better than any airline card. Airlines have an established history of regularly devaluing points, so collecting points is also a fool’s errand.

pennzy:

…Right know, Shop Your Way Mastercard ( previously Sears) is offering 20% back between Oct. 1st-Dec.31st on groceries and gas. Put all your grocery and gas purchases on the card and pay it off every month. Free money…

That’s 20% back in SYWR points, right? It’s not a true 20% back due to limited redemption options.

cpf_borealis · 2019-12-02T23:23:02.000Z

Don’t ask financial questions on a non-finance forum and expect to receive good or complete answers. Go straight to the experts. FragileDeal is a refuge for former FatWallet Finance members (FatWallet was acquired by eBates, then Rakuten, and eventually killed off). Please note that it is mostly USA-centric. Here’s a thread about all the best credit cards for every purpose, and the wiki is more-or-less current: Best Reward / Cash Back Credit Cards

Ask all your personal finance questions on that forum (by either creating a new thread or posting here). Other reasonable places for personal finance questions like credit cards include Bogleheads and reddit/r/personalfinance. DoctorOfCredit metioned earlier by @lotrbfme is a great resource for banking promotions, rules, and benefits, but it’s a blog without a discussion forum, so don’t expect personalized answers.

But to answer Yourrid’s question “what are your preferred cards and why”, I use Citi Costco for gas (4% cash back), Chase Sapphire Reserve (a.k.a. CSR) for travel and dining (3x UR with a 1.5x multiplier = 4.5% cash back, minus the annual fee), Chase Amazon at all Amazon properties (5% cash back with Prime or 3% without Prime), Chase Ink Cash at office supply stores (5x UR, or ~7.5% cash back with CSR), and Alliant CU Visa Signature for everything else (2.5% cash back minus the annual fee). I use Citi Costco if buying appliances and electronics at Costco, because all Citi cards give 2 years of Extended Warranty. Otherwise I use Alliant at Costco (it’s a Visa). I also have Discover It and Chase Freedom for the quarterly 5%/5xUR categories, a few Amex cards for Amex Offers, and a few other random aged cards to keep my credit scores high. And if you’re wondering about credit scores, the answer is no — the number of credit cards does not negatively impact your score in the long term. It’s the opposite — the more cards you have and the older they are, the less of an impact each new card makes on the score. This is a topic for a separate discussion in an appropriate forum.

I used to be very much against annual fees, but with the cards I’m using the difference in rewards (between what I’m getting and what I could be getting from the next best card without the annual fee) exceeds the fee. For one example, I can justify the fee for CSR because I also have Ink and Freedom, I can combine points, and CSR has the 1.5x redemption multiplier. For another example, the breakeven between Citi Double Cash (2% cash back, no fee) and Alliant (2.5% cash back, $99 fee) is $99/0.005 = $19800 in annual spend. I don’t normally spend that much, but there are other tricks I can use to offset the fee. For example, I can pay property and federal and state income taxes with it. The fee for paying those with a credit card are about 2-2.3%, so I’m getting more cash back than I pay in fees. Of course this is not for everyone.

cpf_borealis · 2019-12-02T23:28:25.000Z

pennzy:

While we are on the subject of CCs, has the Equifax breach affected anyone concerning cards being hacked? Mine are being hacked regularly. Just wondering if it is just mine.

This does not make sense. The Equifax breach did not give anyone access to your credit cards, only to your personal information (name, address, SSN, etc). I don’t recall if the breach contained account numbers, but even if it did, it should have only had partial account numbers like you see in your own report. Either way, the account number is not enough to use the cards, and I doubt anyone would try to guess the expiration dates and the CVV, it’s silly. Most likely your cards’ magnetic strip is being cloned at some local store or restaurant that you visit. It’s almost impossible to clone the EMV chip, so just do your best to never use the magnetic strip to make payments.

pennzy · 2019-12-03T13:59:26.000Z

cpf_borealis:

bushmaster:

Citibank Costco Visa card. 4% on gas, 3% travel and dining, 2% on everything at Costco, 1 % on everything else. Very good card IF you are a Costco member. Benefits come as a Costco rebate to be spent there. If you are a Costco shopper, you already know that isn’t hard to do.

You don’t have to spend the rebate at Costco, you can get cash at a register or at the service desk for high amounts.

nquinn:

The most valuable credit cards are those that issue airline points, but you have to play the game properly.

This is debatable. The most valuable part of airline credit cards is the signup bonus. After the signup bonus you can’t get much value from the points received for regular spending. For most people, especially those who don’t travel first/business class, a straight up 2% cash back credit card would work better than any airline card. Airlines have an established history of regularly devaluing points, so collecting points is also a fool’s errand.

pennzy:

…Right know, Shop Your Way Mastercard ( previously Sears) is offering 20% back between Oct. 1st-Dec.31st on groceries and gas. Put all your grocery and gas purchases on the card and pay it off every month. Free money…

That’s 20% back in SYWR points, right? It’s not a true 20% back due to limited redemption options.

No, 20% back in statement credit up to $120 per month.

pennzy · 2019-12-03T15:00:47.000Z

cpf_borealis:

pennzy:

While we are on the subject of CCs, has the Equifax breach affected anyone concerning cards being hacked? Mine are being hacked regularly. Just wondering if it is just mine.

This does not make sense. The Equifax breach did not give anyone access to your credit cards, only to your personal information (name, address, SSN, etc). I don’t recall if the breach contained account numbers, but even if it did, it should have only had partial account numbers like you see in your own report. Either way, the account number is not enough to use the cards, and I doubt anyone would try to guess the expiration dates and the CVV, it’s silly. Most likely your cards’ magnetic strip is being cloned at some local store or restaurant that you visit. It’s almost impossible to clone the EMV chip, so just do your best to never use the magnetic strip to make payments.

Then it is unexplainable. Most cards of mine that have been hacked have been cards I don’t even use. The last one was a new card that had not even reached me yet. The replacement card arrived before the hacked card arrived. I believe the Equafax breach did leak complete card #s.They do have them.

cpf_borealis · 2019-12-03T23:44:39.000Z

pennzy:

No, 20% back in statement credit up to $120 per month.

Do you have a link to this promo? I can’t find anything like it.

pennzy:

Then it is unexplainable. Most cards of mine that have been hacked have been cards I don’t even use. The last one was a new card that had not even reached me yet. The replacement card arrived before the hacked card arrived.

Then this definitely has nothing to do with Equifax, because Equifax would not have received the new card number so quickly.

This actually happened to me a few years ago, it was a Chase Business card. I kept getting fraudulent charges on newly replaced cards even though I used them once or not at all. One such replacement card had unauthorized charges posted before I even received that card in the mail. I had to replace the card 4 or 5 times within 2-3 months and Chase removed all unauthorized charges, but it was very bizarre. The only time charges might be forwarded to new cards is in case of recurring charges, like a cable or cell phone bill, because the card issuers inform the billers of the new account numbers. In my case they were not recurring charges, just new charges from different places.

pennzy · 2019-12-04T00:57:12.000Z

[quote=cpf_borealis]

pennzy:

No, 20% back in statement credit up to $120 per month.

Do you have a link to this promo? I can’t find anything like it.

I can’t provide a link. It came in an email . Says it is non transferable.
I can’t find it online .

I searched the Equalfax breach today and it said 200,000 people’s complete CC #s were leaked. These probably were only from a certain time period so only older existing cards would be affected. The other people affected only lost personal info. If you can believe them. They are pretty shady.

raccoon · 2019-12-13T23:18:50.000Z

raccoon city:

...so I applied for one here:

https://www.ghpfcu.org/visa-credit-cards

That card requires that you or someone in your family is a police officer, so I don't qualify for it.

I applied for a credit card here:

https://www.bannerbank.com/personal/credit-cards

...and got turned down.

Then I remembered that last year I received an Amazon Visa card that I never activated.

The interest rate is 15.74%, which is better than the card that I don't like.

So I activated my Amazon Visa card, which offers some cash back.

This looks like the best I'll be able to get.

My credit score is really good, but my income is pretty low, and I don't buy anything in installments, which is probably why I kept getting turned down.

But my Amazon Visa card is decent, with a much lower interest rate than the card I've been using for the last twenty years.

pennzy · 2019-12-14T17:17:53.000Z

raccoon city:

raccoon city:

…so I applied for one here:

https://www.ghpfcu.org/visa-credit-cards

That card requires that you or someone in your family is a police officer, so I don’t qualify for it.

I applied for a credit card here:

https://www.bannerbank.com/personal/credit-cards

…and got turned down.

Then I remembered that last year I received an Amazon Visa card that I never activated.

The interest rate is 15.74%, which is better than the card that I don’t like.

So I activated my Amazon Visa card, which offers some cash back.

This looks like the best I’ll be able to get.

My credit score is really good, but my income is pretty low, and I don’t buy anything in installments, which is probably why I kept getting turned down.

But my Amazon Visa card is decent, with a much lower interest rate than the card I’ve been using for the last twenty years.

If you are interested in a low interest rate card, Simmons Bank is only 9.75% and has been for almost forever.

simmonsbank.com

Credit Cards | Simmons Bank

Compare our Visa® credit cards to find the right one for you.

raccoon · 2019-12-14T20:38:39.000Z

pennzy:

If you are interested in a low interest rate card, Simmons Bank is only 9.75% and has been for almost forever. https://simmonsbank.com/bank/credit-cards

Thanks!

That looks like a good deal.

jmpaul320 · 2019-12-14T21:33:12.000Z

citi double cash seems to be the easiest with 2% cash back on everything

and other assorted store cards that give moar… amazon, target, costco etc.