I’ve written about those $15 checks that credit card issuers send you to try out their overpriced credit “protection” programs, so when I ran across this offer from Citibank for $100 in free gas rebate coupons for enrolling in a free 30-day trial, I was a bit suspicious.

I’ve gotten these before, but they were broken up into $10 rebates, one a month, and only valid if you stayed with the service. On top of that, they take months to fulfill, and if by the time they finally decide to stop stalling and process the rebate you’ve already cancelled, then oops! no money for you. In other words, it was a pain. Would this be similar?

Probably, but maybe not as bad – According to recent reports on Fatwallet, the rebate coupon they mail you is for $100 all at once. One catch is that you must submit gas receipts within 30 days of purchase. So if you can’t spend $100 on gas in 30 days, you may not get the full $100. Others suggested just picking up old receipts off the ground to satisfy the $100 requirement. I also asked if you still need to be enrolled for the rebate to process, and will update if I get an answer.

As will most of these credit protector trials, you are automatically enrolled after the initial period unless you call to cancel. For my own memory, the number to cancel is 1-888-592-7344. The program fee is 85 cents per $100 of your monthly balance. Thus, you should always try to sign up with an idle credit card with no balance. That way, even if you forget, you won’t be charged anything.

Thanks to Reader Paul who reminded me of this and also reports that you can’t use the Citi Professional Card, which a lot of people have from the $100 bonus, have to sign up. I tried too and it didn’t work. I did sign up successfully using another Citi card. I’ll try my best to remember to update here when I get the forms, and also post again in 30 days to remind people to cancel.

I hate it when I just plain forget to post things, which is I’m glad I did that survey 😉 One of the main reasons why I brought up the fact that anyone can apply for business credit cards is that you can take out 0% APR balance transfers (see my detailed posts on how I do this first) and because business accounts and balances don’t show up on your consumer credit report, it won’t dink your personal credit score. The only problem is that business credit card offers tend not to be as juicy as the best consumer card offers. Still, here are some of the better ones. Again, I’m looking for 0% APR for the longest time, applying to both purchases and balance transfers, no annual fees, and lowest balance transfer fees.

Advanta Platinum Rewards BusinessCard MasterCard – No annual fee, 0% APR fixed for 15 months on balance transfers, balance transfer fee of 3% (min $5, max $50). This probably the longest one I’ve seen. There is also a cashback program, but don’t use this when you have a balance transfer.

Chase Platinum Business Rebate Card – No annual fee, 0% APR fixed for 12 months on purchases and balance transfers, balance transfer fee of 3% (min $5, max $75). 3% Cash Back on for purchases at restaurants, gas stations, office supply stores, building supply stores, hardware and home improvement stores

Chase Business Cash Rewards Card – Similar to above; No annual fee, 0% APR fixed for 12 months on purchases and balance transfers, balance transfer fee of 3% (min $5, max $75). Somewhat confusing tiered cashback program up of to 5% back. May be worth it for big spenders.

CitiBusiness Card with ThankYou Network – No annual fee, 0% APR fixed for 12 months on purchases, see application for balance transfer fee detail. There is also a $100 Gift Card after you make $250 in purchases!

Update: The below promotion is now expired. The New Business Gold Rewards Card® from American Express OPEN now offers 3X points on airfare, 2X points on advertising, gas, and shipping and 1X point on everything else. The annual fee for this card is $175 but it is waived for all new cardholders. You can also get unlimited additional gold cards for an extra annual fee of $50 but this fee is waived for the first year as well.

Thanks to Aruna for pointing out in my Two $100 Business Credit Card Bonuses post that on top the $100 statement credit for the New Business Gold Rewards Card® from American Express OPEN, you can also get a boatload of Membership Rewards points during the first year. It starts at 5,000 free points for doing nothing, and goes all the way up to 100,000 points with enough spending. That’s 100,000 not just 10,000!

It’s a bit hidden – if you click on the ‘Learn More’ link on the application page, you’ll see the bonus points offer, which works out to:

5,000 free points for doing nothing.
10,000 free points total for spending $20,000 in the first year
30,000 free points total for spending $50,000
90,000 free points total for spending $60,000 ($5,000 avg x 12 mo)

(The last 10,000 points for the one-year card renewal, which you’ll be charged $125 for, so you’ll have to decide if it’s worth it. The first year’s annual fee is already waived.)

Membership Rewards points are similar to Citi ThankYou points, but you can also transfer them into frequent flyer miles with many programs like Delta and Southwest Airlines. You get 1 point per dollar spent on your AmEx card, although there are occasional ‘Double Mile’ promotions. Overall, I would value them at about 1 cent per point, as you can either go for airline miles or things like gift cards (10,000 points = $100 gift card at stores like Banana Republic or Home Depot). In the past, I used to transfer my points into Southwest Airlines credits, and then sell the flight vouchers on eBay to get more like 1.5 cents/mile.

At 1 cent/point x 5,000 points, you are getting $50 for doing nothing. So in essence with one purchase you get the $100 statement credit and $50 in points for $150 total.

If you can spend $60,000 in one year, things get interesting. You get 60,000 points directly for the spending, and then you get 90,000 bonus points, for a total of 150,000 points on $60,000 of spending. That works out to a healthy 2.5% cashback, again at 1 cent per point. On top of that you also still get the $100 statement credit.

Remember, anyone can apply for a business credit card!

Many people aren’t aware of the fact that anyone can apply for business credit cards, even if they are not part of a corporation or LLC. Just use your own name as the business name, and your Social Security Number as the Tax ID.

Why? Because any individual can be a business as well. The business type is called a sole proprietorship. Maybe you sell garage sale items or crafts on eBay. Boom! You’re a sole proprietorship. Done any freelance work for a friend? You’re a sole proprietorship. This is the most simple business entity, but it is fully legit and recognized by the IRS. Unless you apply for another one, the name of your business is your legal name, eg. John Doe.

When you apply for a business credit card, you will have to put down both your Social Security number and the Tax ID number for the business. If you are a Sole Proprietorship, you Tax ID is your Social Security Number. (Unless you filed for a EIN). For the vast majority of business credit cards, if even you are a corporation or LLC, you will still be personally liable for business debts. That’s why they’ll usually ask you for your SSN anyways.

Remember, if you are a sole proprietorship there is no legal distinction between you and your business anyhow. Business debts are personal debts. Personal debts are business debts.

(Also, unless you want to deduct your purchases as qualified business expenses on your tax return, you really don’t need to worry about any tax issues or filing anything special with the IRS. You can simply buy things with the card and pay off the balance as you would your other credit cards. If you do want to take deductions, please consult your tax advisor.)

Because of this liability, you will get a hard credit inquiry to your personal credit report just like apply for a consumer card so that the issuer can make a decision whether to offer you credit. (Now, businesses can also have their own credit scores, but that’s another post for another time.) However, for most business credit cards the card itself won’t show up on your personal credit report. This means that you can open and close accounts, have a bunch of new accounts, and max out the credit lines without affecting your personal credit card score. This also means you can make thousands from playing the 0% Balance Transfer game without worrying about your credit score!

In addition, I use this fact to get more credit card bonuses. I was reminded of this recently by my mom, actually. My parents live in a smaller city which is basically only served by Delta Airlines, so they love SkyMiles. When you are in a small city, tickets are expensive since you can’t get a nonstop flight. So they always get over 2 cents to the mile when redeeming for free tickets.

Anyways, my mom applied for the Gold Delta SkyMiles American Express Card for the 17,500 free bonus miles (Even though now new card owners can earn 30,000 miles), and then my dad applied for the SkyMiles card for the free miles. My mom asked me if she could cancel the card and apply again to get more free miles. Not so quickly, I don’t think, but while don’t you apply for the Delta Business SkyMiles AmEx card for another 20,000 free miles? First year is even free too. She applied and got accepted, now next Thanksgiving is at my place 😉