American Express OPEN is a service for small business owners. In order to help small business owners manage their finance, OPEN offers a number of credit cards that are aimed at providing business owners a tool to facilitate business transactions and earn rewards at the same time. One of the business cards from American Express OPEN is the Starwood Preferred Guest Business Credit Card, a travel rewards credit card for business owners who often stay at Starwood hotels and resorts. With the Starwood Preferred Guest Business Card, business owners not only get the benefits that every AMEX cardholder enjoys, but also the rewards that let them earn free stay at their favorite hotels faster. Plus, Starwood Preferred Guest Business Card holder can get discount for using the card at FedEx, Hertz, and other companies for their business.

So exactly what kind of benefits can you expect when becoming a holder of the Starwood Preferred Guest Business Card? Well, the Starwood card can reward you both for staying at Starwood hotels and making everyday purchases for your business. Particularly, the rewards program give one point for every dollar you charge on the card and two points per dollar for charging for staying at participating Starwood properties and retail outlets. Starwood Points that you earned from using the card can be redeemed for free hotel stays at over 1,000 hotels and resorts in nearly 100 countries, airline tickets at over 350 airlines, or other products and services provided by AMEX and other merchants and retailers. And if you stay 2 nights at a Sheraton hotels and resorts anywhere in the world, you will get the 3rd night free. You can even transfer Starpoints to other frequent flyer programs and earn rewards at the same time. Currently, if you transfer 20,000 Starpoints to another frequent flyer program, you can get 5,000 points back as bonus. Not many cards give you such flexibility in using the rewards.

So, do you think the Starwood Preferred Guest Business Card is a credit card that fits your business? If you do, you can certainly take advantage of the promotional offer from AMEX which will give you 10,000 bonus Starpoints after the first purchase and another 15,000 bonus Starpoints when you spend $5,000 in 6 months – enough for up to 6 free nights at a Category 1 or 2 hotel.  Even though the card has an annual membership fee of $65, it is waived for the first year.

Original Post on www.thesunsfinancialdiary.com

Special Promotional Offers

• Free 401(K) Fee Analyzer
• Scottrade 3 Commission Free Trades
• Citi Dividend Select Platinum Card $100 Bonus
• Citibank Checking Account $300 Gift Card Promotion

These days, it’s pretty difficult to find a credit card that doesn’t offer any reward to cardholder. I remember when I got my first ever credit card nearly 15 years ago, it was very rare for a card issuer to give cardholder any benefit of using the card. For me, I was happy to just have a credit card so that I could start to build credit. I never thought about getting some back for using credit cards. Things have changed a lot over the years. Nowadays, almost every credit card in the prime card category offers card members some sorts of benefits, cash back, miles, or points, and 1% rewards on every dollar spent are pretty standard. If I go shop for a credit card today, I wouldn’t even consider any cards that don’t come with a nice membership rewards program or sign up bonus, unless there’s something that’s truly special.

One credit card, Citi Simplicity® Card, belongs to the latter category. Unlike other Citibank credit cards that give you rewards in one form or another, the Simplicity Card offers no benefit to cardholder at all. What you will get from this card instead is a 0% APR introductory period that’s one and a half years long. There is no short of credit cards that offer 0% APR for balance transfer or purchase, but 12-month is what you usually gets from such an offer. The 18-month 0% APR offer from Citi Simplicity® Card is what makes the card different from others. Since there’s no other benefits from this card, I would imagine that those who want to apply for the Simplicity Card mainly go after the exceptionally long zero interest period to make big purchases, either using the card to pay for the purchase directly or making balance transfer with the card and using the money for whatever purpose. The 18-month no interest promotion period makes the card an ideal tool to get a short-term loan. Think about it. If you go to people to people lending sites such as Lending Club to borrow a 36-month loan, you would have to 6+% interest rate for the money you borrowed even if you have top-rate credit. It’s quite obvious that Citi Simplicity® Card is a better choice in this case even though you won’t get 36 months for the interest free loan.

To make the offer even more appealing, Citi Simplicity® Card charges no late fees and no penalty rate. It means that even if you are late in making payment, your rate will not go up, like what will happen with other credit cards. This isn’t just for the introductory rate for the balance transfer or purchase. Cardholders can enjoy this benefit all the time. And best of all, this card has no annual membership fee.

If you are looking for a credit card that can simplify the way to manage, you may want to consider Citi Simplicity® Card.

Original Post on www.thesunsfinancialdiary.com

Special Promotional Offers

• Free 401(K) Fee Analyzer
• Scottrade 3 Commission Free Trades
• Citi Dividend Select Platinum Card $100 Bonus
• Citibank Checking Account $300 Gift Card Promotion

Though I have been banking with Bank of America for years, I am not really fan of the bank because I always think doing business with BofA is expensive. Compared with other banks, BofA seems to charge more fees for their services and those fees are usually higher than what other banks charge. For instance, starting late May, BofA customers will pay $12 fee for using their MyAccess Checking Accounts if they can’t meet the requirements for a fee waiver. That monthly fee is at the high end of checking account fees now charged by banks. The main reason that I am still using BofA (just the checking account, nothing else) is convenience, as I mentioned earlier. And even with their Merrill Edge broker service, which offers investor free stock and ETF trading when meeting the requirements, people still don’t like it that much.

However, with the above said, this Bank of Americ credit card does seem to be quite nice, when you consider cash bonus and the introductory cash back rewards. It is the BankAmericard Cash Rewards Visa Signature Card. Basically, if you become a holder of the BankAmericard, you will be eligible for a one-time $100 cash back bonus after you spend at least $500 in the first 90 days of card membership. The reason that this bonus offer is attractive is that the spending limit to qualify for the bonus, $500 in this case, is quite low. From what I know, other credit card issuers usually ask you to spend $700 or more during a three-month period in order to get the same amount of bonus. Lately, credit card issuers are increasingly using spending limit as a condition for new cardholders to get the incentive for the new card, and usually the bigger the incentive, the higher the spending limit. For this particular card, I would say that getting $100 after spending $500 (that’s equivalent to a 20% return in three months) is quite doable. This one-time bonus will be awarded in 8 to 10 weeks after the promotion period, and it will show up in your credit card statement as credit.

Another attraction of this offering is that for new card members, they will be able to earn 5% cash back for shopping at gas stations, grocery stores and drugstores for the first six months. Nowadays, you don’t find many cards offer 5% cash back and if they  do, it’s usually restricted to certain categories that rotate every three months (such as Discover Cards and Chase Freedom Cards). For the BankAmericard, it’s unfortunate that the generous cash back only last for six months. After the promotion period, the card’s cash back program returns to a more standard 1% rebate with no restrictions on where and when to shop to earn rebates, which is the same as what many rewards credit cards are now offering to cardholders as rewards.

BTW, there are currently a few credit card promotions going on. If you don’t like BofA, you may want to check out other offerings, including one from Chase Freedom Card which will give $150 bonus if you can spend more than $500 in the first three months. The Chase offer, in my opinion, is definitely better than this BofA promotion.

Original Post on www.thesunsfinancialdiary.com

Special Promotional Offers

• Free 401(K) Fee Analyzer
• Scottrade 3 Commission Free Trades
• Citi Dividend Select Platinum Card $100 Bonus
• Citibank Checking Account $300 Gift Card Promotion

Are you using any credit monitoring service? If you are, which program is your favorite?

The collapse of the sub-prime mortgage market four years ago led the economy into the severest recession since the great depression. The financial crisis afterwards has fundamentally altered how mortgage applications are processed. If you have recently obtained a mortgage, you know very well what lenders now require from you in order to see whether you are a qualified borrower or not. Among many factors that will determine your qualification, the most important one is your credit history. People with poor credit not only are being scrutinized harder during the loan application, but also face the possibility of having to pay more because the term of their loan may not be as favorable as those who have excellent credit.

With all these changes in the way we obtain credit products such as a loan or a credit card these days, having and maintaining a good credit history becomes more important than ever. One way to stay on top of one’s credit is to keep a close eye on activities in your credit report by using a credit monitoring service. With such a service, you will be alerted if anything unauthorized, such as a new credit card that you didn’t open, appears in your report.

There are a lot of credit protection services out there. One of them is IDFreeze from TrustedID which provides identity theft prevention services to protect you against any credit fraud.

As mentioned above, credit monitoring services usually inform their customers after they have already been hit by credit fraud. The difference between TrustedID and other protection services is that the former will actually block unauthorized attempt to access your credit report. Since lenders and credits always pull your credit report before making a decision on whether to issue a loan or credit card, by preventing access to you credit report without permission, what IDFreeze does is that it essentially prevents credit fraud from happening in the first place.  In addition to the prevention, TrustedID also provide their customers other services, such as credit monitoring, free three-bureau credit reports, etc., all of these aim to protect your from becoming a victim of credit fraud and ID theft.

While the main goal of IDFreeze is identity theft prevention, if for some reason you are hit by ID fraud when you are a customer of the service, TrusedID will provide help to restore your credit. Each TrustedID customer is covered by $1,000,000 in identity theft insurance which can be used to pay any out-of-pocket costs related to identity theft that was not stopped by IDFreeze.

So, what do you think of IDFreeze from TrustedID? If you are interested, you can sign up for IDFreeze to see if it meets your requirement on credit monitoring and ID prevention. The whole sign-up process takes only a few minutes to complete, and once you signed up, TrustedID will immediately take all of the necessary steps to start protecting your identity.

Original Post on www.thesunsfinancialdiary.com

Special Promotional Offers

• Free 401(K) Fee Analyzer
• Scottrade 3 Commission Free Trades
• Citi Dividend Select Platinum Card $100 Bonus
• Citibank Checking Account $300 Gift Card Promotion

Discover has an array of credit cards for people with different shopping habits. One of them, the Discover Open Road Card, which is one of the best gas/auto rewards credit cards, is designed specially for cardholders to earn cash backs when spending money on gasoline and car repairs and routine maintenances. With the average price of a gallon of gas approaching $4, the Open Road Card, and its build-in cash back rewards program, can give card members some relief during the coming summer driving season.

The most attractive benefits of the Discover Open Road Card is its generous rebates on gas and restaurant purchases. Now it’s quite common for credit card users to receive 1% cash back on everyday purchases. With the Discover Open Road Card, cardholders can earn 2% cash back bonus when using the card to pay for gas and food at any restaurant. Unlike other credit cards that rotate its cash back categories every quarter, the Open Road Card allows you to earn 2% rebates all year long, so there’s no need to remember when to switch cards for different rewards. Of course, the cash back rewards program of the Open Road Card covers more then just gas and food. In fact, you can use the card for your everyday purchases and still earn rebates. Currently, you’ll earn a 1% rebate on every other purchase after you spend more than $3,000 in a year. Before reaching the $3,000 spending limit, every dollar you spent will earn you 0.25%. You can also earn between 5% and 20% Cashback bonus when you shop with over 150 online retailers through ShopDiscover.com, Discover’s exclusive online shopping mall.

There is no yearly limit on the amount of rebates that can be earned, and rebates do not expire as long as the account is active within a 36-month period.

As an added bonus, cardholders can earn up to a double Cashback Bonus when redeeming their rebates for gift certificates from participating Discover Card Partners. Plus, they receive a free $150 Restaurant.com gift certificate with first purchase! This card has an attractive 0% introductory APR on purchases and balance transfers for 12 months. The APR for this card is reasonable, although it is important to note that only higher qualifying applicants will receive the lowest rate available.

In addition to the rewards program, the card also provides several platinum benefits, including travel accident insurance, auto rental insurance, and various fraud and security protection services.

• Free $150 Restaurant.com Gift Certificate with first purchase
• 2% Cashback Bonus automatically at any gas station and any restaurant
• 5% to 20% Cashback Bonus at over 150 top retailers through our online shopping mall
• Up to 1% unlimited Cashback Bonus on all other purchases
• 0% intro APR on balance transfers for 12 months, then the Regular APR
• 0% intro APR on purchases for 12 months, then the Regular APR

Original Post on www.thesunsfinancialdiary.com

Special Promotional Offers

• Free 401(K) Fee Analyzer
• Scottrade 3 Commission Free Trades
• Citi Dividend Select Platinum Card $100 Bonus
• Citibank Checking Account $300 Gift Card Promotion