Charity Credit Cards

Charity credit cards are a relatively new product on the market for credit card consumers. To make an educated choice in the credit card you should have, you have to know what these cards are all about. In this section we are looking specifically at the charity cards, and the advantages and disadvantages of the cards. Charity credit cards are associated with a charity or fund either in the UK or in the world. As you know, a charity is a place that raises money for those who need it. You have cancer charities, aids charities, World Wildlife Fund, and many others. Charity credit cards are very specific. Typically there is only one credit card available for the charity you want to contribute to. We will get into that later.

A charity card is going to offer a donation to the charity based on a percentage of what you spend on the card. When you sign up for the card the credit card issuer usually donates twenty- five pounds to the charity. After the initial donation the credit card issuer will take 25p of 100 pounds of what you spend or .25 percent of everything you spend and donate it to the charity. Some credit cards will offer 1 percent of everything you spend to charity.

There is only one advantage to the charity credit cards. You are unconsciously donating money to a charity each time you use your card. I say unconsciously because most of us never find the time to sit down each month to determine what we can give to a charity. With the charity card you know that when you use it you are donating a little something over time, but you probably do not think about how much you actually donate.

A major disadvantage of the credit card is how much they actually give to charity over time. As you saw above, you give about 25p per 100 pounds that you spend. In the scheme of things that is not a lot of money. You would have to spend over a thousand pounds to make the donation from you worthy.

If you consider how much you spend in interest each month on the card that is money you could be sending to your favourite charity. For example, if you spend a hundred pounds on your card each month and only pay the minimum payment with an interest rate of 15.4 percent you are probably spending close to 300 to 500 pounds a year on interest that could go to charity.

So without the card you could consciously offer more money to your charity. Unfortunately most of us do not take the time to donate to a charity, without someone helping us. The charity credit cards are like all other credit cards. You have interest, introductory deals, and fees if you miss or make late payments. The advantages and disadvantages of all credit cards will apply to the charity credit cards, as well as the specific ones we discussed above.