Special Offers from Your Credit Card

In today's marketplace, consumers have many different credit cards to choose from when it comes to obtaining new credit. Before you decide on a new lender, be sure to ask about what types of special offers or promotions your credit card company provides its customers. Here's a rundown of some of the more common perks from credit card companies.

Credit card convenience checks

Almost every credit card company will send convenience checks to its best customers to draw against their credit card. Convenience checks are a great way to make a cash payment to yourself and pay it back on your credit card, make a large purchase which you prefer to pay for over time, or use with any companies which do not take credit cards (merchants, medical firms, insurance companies, etc.).

Before you use a convenience check, review the conditions and restrictions that apply. Often your credit card company will offer you a lower interest rate for purchases if you use these special checks. In some cases the lower rate may never increase; in other cases the rate will apply for a specific time period then revert to your standard annual interest rate.

It's also important to know that the balance of any cash transactions on your credit card, including balances incurred by using convenience checks, will be paid down only after you have paid off our balance for purchases. For this reason, you might end up paying interest on your cash advances for a much longer period of time. And since convenience check interest rates may be higher than your standard rate, this can cost you a lot of extra money in the long run.

Balance transfer offers from your credit card company

If you're trying to manage your debt more effectively, consider taking advantage of a balance transfer special offer from your credit card company. This handy debt management tool lets you transfer an existing balance from one credit card to a card with a lower interest rate. As with convenience checks, however, it's important to review the details of the balance transfer offer to know what restrictions may apply. Often the rate you receive for the balance transfer will stay intact until you pay off the debt, but in other cases the interest rate will increase to a higher rate after a specified period of time.