Deals.Woot

It can be good. Almost every offer has slightly different terms, so if you really want it, read the fine print and compare them. Also, I haven't seen a 5% across the board (but it may be the particular card I have). They recently switched to the 5% but I think it's only in certain categories, and the categories rotate quarterly. Also, I believe you have to sign up for the special rate each time it switches. Some of my details may be off, but that's how they have been doing it. If you have the time and energy, and they give you a low fixed rate, and you pay off your balance, it's a great card. Otherwise, six of one, half a dozen of the other.

I actually do have a Chase Credit card, I opted for the freedom because I'm not really into collecting travel miles, nor do I have a business. Like @thepenrod stated, the 5% is a selection of categories that shifts quarterly. Also he was accurate in stating that you must sign up for the 5%, gets annoying but whatever. I believe this quarter gives 5% on home improvement, lawn and garden, home furnishings and drug stores, just an fyi. The 1% is on everything else. Personally I'm quite content with my card, the online payments and services are very good as well as the customer service.

I wouldn't do business with any of the "too big to fail" banks. Their business model is dependent on fees, fines, and penalties so some day, you will make a mistake and they will get back enough to pay for every benefit you have ever received. Getting $.40 every time someone swipes their card isn't near enough to keep these behemoths going.

Find a local non-profit, operated for the benefit of the members, credit union and you will be forever happy.

@colonelpuffpuff - Agreed I have a Discover Card, an Amex, and 2 Visas all of them becase they pay me to use their card. I put about 30k on them a year and pay them off. For my 30k I get about 200 in cash back, 2 free hotel stays a year plus other benefits like extended warranties and etc... In this case this year I am getting 2 free flights to europe which retail value is over 1000 all of this without annual fees.

The key use it for everything then pay it off each month. You never incur fees and you get paid to spend your money. (The funny part is they loose money on you when you dont carry a balance and you don't pay interest but hey its there fault for sending me offers in the mail. I think they are hoping that one day I might just go crazy and acutally use the 10k credit line then not pay it off)

We put EVERYTHING on our Chase card (if I could get the bank to put our mortgage on there I would do that, too.) and use our points to buy gift cards. Most of our relatives live elsewhere and it's much easier to mail a gift card that choose a gift anyway.

On the flip side, the merchant fees for accepting credit cards is one of our largest business expenses. If you want to know how credit cards can afford to give you cash back with no annual fee, that's how. The merchant fees for Discover are really high, hence the big cash back reward.

@hlx: I use my Discover almost EVERYWHERE (the only place I go that doesn't accept it is my vet and the kid's college and I have a VISA reward card for that).

@djbowman: Congrats on your perks. I love to see when people make the system work for them. I might have to add an airline card to mine collection.

ohcheri has it right. The credit card companies make anything from 1.5%-5% on merchant fees. Just think if Discover is paying me $200 a year (1%), they are making $600 a year (3% min) in merchant fees.

@colonepuffpuff: I acutally hate aireline cards like really hate ! They never work out in the wash. However, this offer comes up about once every 2 years and is quite famous on the internet.

Assuming you can put 2500 bucks on the card in 90 days you end up with 100,000 miles which is 2 tickets to Europe at 50k each.

http://www.mychasecreditcards.com/ba/100/

Other than this one I have not found much in the airline cards that I like. (note you have to have pretty good credit to get approved for this one and it does have an annual fee. Though in this case I would use for first year to get miles then cancel and go back to my other cards. I figure a 60$ annual fee is worth)

In note of annual fee though I do have one chase card that has an annual fee it is the Old Marriott Card. It is a $65 annual fee but every year this auto-upgrades me to silver elite and gives me a free night stay usually I cash that in for a 130~160 a night stay so its worth the fee to me every year

@djbowman: Agreed. I don't pay attention to interest rates because I plan to never have to pay them. That being said, the two cards I use most frequently have rates of 9% and 11%.

@wootbretz: Yeah fair point. I really should look into one that is truly low interest and no fees etc with crappy rewards in case I really needed it but for me to use a credit card as source of emergency money (ie over an extended period I might run 10k onto it and then get the money somehwere else at a better interest then pay it off in the 60 day cycle) the world would probably be having to come to an end. And by that I mean I would have eaten all of my food stores and other things for emergencies and figure what the heck the worlds ending anyway so I might as well run up credit card bills I dont have to pay.

Thanks for all the answers, folks. Sounds like I will need to spend some time checking the fine print on the applications, and maybe look into Discover as well.