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Rewards, oh sweet rewards

September 25th, 2013 at 05:34 pm

I have had a credit card with rewards for years now but I had just let them pile up in hopes to earn enough for a free trip. Since it is an AMEX though it was though to accumulate points as most places wouldn't accept it. I gave up on the dream after a while and ended up with about 10K points.

After coming to this site I realized I should pay more attention to my rewards and so I investigated and found out I could convert them for almost 100 in cash. That was pretty exciting so I immediately cashed them in. That's just 100 more toward my savings goals almost effortlessly. Then I went to two more rewards programs I participate in and found that I had almost 60.00 in rewards that I had not claimed yet. That is going into the Christmas fund. How exciting. In about a half about I had an extra 160. I really need to stay on top of those rewards!!

9 Responses to “Rewards, oh sweet rewards”

  1. creditcardfree Says:
    1380127210

    Glad you find some of your hidden money! Smile

  2. beawealthywarrior Says:
    1380127373

    Sweet!

  3. Petunia 100 Says:
    1380127443

    That $160 would pay off CC1 in full, leaving $43.50 for savings/Christmas. Then you'd be out from under it, and that nasty 29.99% interest.

    Just a thought. Smile
    Congrats on collecting your money. I love rewards, they certainly are sweet.

  4. creditcardfree Says:
    1380127935

    Petunia, has a very good point. Money you didn't know you had is always good for paying down debt.

  5. Permanent Temp Says:
    1380128147

    @Petunia100 There is money is already allotted toward the credit card. It's being paid off next week. Smile That card stinks I racked it up in college to its full limit (3K) and paid it off with an inheritance. Then when I got out of college I had no savings (the rest of my inheritance had to pay the difference between my loans and my fees for my last few semesters) and somehow maxed it out again!

    At my last contract job I paid it off and didn't use it for a full year. This year they sent me my new card as the other had expired and I told them there was no reason for me to activate it unless they lowered my interest rate or converted it into a rewards card. So they converted it. They mentioned that if I use it more they might consider lowering the APR so during my medical crisis I used it so I wouldn't have to carry around so much cash in my pocket and transferred the money over from my bank account. Problem was having it in my pocket I somehow racked up an extra 500 besides that. I just paid the 500 off last week and decided to use it again this week for my baseball ticket but as of 10/5 it will be paid off again, and its out of my wallet so I don't inadvertently rack up any extra money on it. The thing that makes me most angry about that interest rate is that it is from one late payment 6 years ago. I had a bad crisis that left me broke and so I couldn't make the payment and they hiked up my rate and have refused to lower it. But at least now I have rewards.

    Also by the times the rewards actually process the card will have already been paid off by my paycheck. Smile

  6. Petunia 100 Says:
    1380140594

    As long as you are paying in full every month, the interest rate doesn't matter. Smile
    Is your credit score good now? If so, there are 0% balance transfer offers out there. If you could get the debt on CC2 financed at 0% for 12 or 18 months, that would make it easier to pay off.

  7. Permanent Temp Says:
    1380145180

    I think it's in the upper 600's but now that you mention it I do have a card with a much lower interest rate at 10.24% which has been paid off since it had a small balance on it. I just got an email about a balance transfer deal so maybe I'll look into doing that, but that cards limit is 2K and I don't want it to be maxed out. This one is 3K limit. Would the utilization change be a ding on my credit score?

  8. Permanent Temp Says:
    1380145664

    Okay just looked the deal is for it to be 0.00% rate and a fee of 3%. If I know I'm getting a paycheck after the next one (I'm a temp and the project is winding down.) Then I'll be making a large payment on CC2 and would be able to transfer the whole balance.

  9. PatientSaver Says:
    1380197253

    That's great. Yes, definitely stay on top of those cc rewards. That's the only reason I use them, and as I've mentioned here before, I rack up quite a bit in rewards. This year and last it was in the $1,000 area and i will be summarizing it all in my end of year financial report here!

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