A Credit Cards Comparison Of Rewards For Holiday Shopping With Premium Credit Cards

Why not make a little extra cash while you're getting ready for the holidays. Premium credit cards don't just offer rewards on travel, some also offer rewards on purchases like petrol and groceries. If you plan early enough, the rewards you earn throughout the year can be used to offset the cost of the holidays near the end of the year. Use grocery cards to defray the cost of the holiday meal. Use shopping rewards to get gifts for people without it costing you as much. Make the shopping trips with a card that rewards you each time you fill up the tank. When all the hustle and bustle has died down, take out your air miles rewards card and take a holiday of your own to a warmer climate where you don't have to do a thing other than sit on the beach, if that's what you want to do. Here are a few ways to get started making money for the holidays.

Grocery

These cards are ideal to carry all year around. Several places offer grocery reward cards like Tesco, Sainsbury's, and Asda. Typically, you get a set number of points per pound spent. The points are redeemable for vouchers or discounts on specific rewards that you choose. Those that offer cashback instead, will post the cashback to your account in the following month after you make your purchases. Aside from premium credit cards, grocery shoppers can also use store loyalty cards to reduce the amount upon checkout. In that case, you might get the discount applied before the final tally and then you can also pay with your rewards cards. This way, you make use of two different way to earn back some of the money you spend on food for the holidays.

Shopping

People purchase all sorts of gift items during the holidays from clothing to personalised gift cards. Sometimes, you can get store credit cards that will offer some rewards back for being a loyal shopper with a particular store. Every day about this time of year, grocery stores also offer some sort of additional incentive for buying gift cards in multiple packs or spending a set amount in a clothing store. However, some cards, like the Marks and Spencer card, excludes shirts and personalised gift cards from their rewards program. You can still get one point per pound spent in an M&S store, but that only applies to certain purchases. So, be careful to read the fine print on a card before assuming you will be making some cashback on it.

Petrol - The Tesco card can also be used for fuel purchases that are no Esso Fuel, and that will count towards points on the Tesco reward system. The Santander's 123 card also offers 3 per cent cashback on almost all major petrol stations. There are cards exclusively for rewards on fuel purchase, but the Santander's 123 is a general all around rewards card that offers 2 per cent cashback on shopping on major department stores and 1 per cent on most major supermarkets. It will even give you cashback rewards on some rail rides, so it is a good all-around card for savings during the holidays.

Air miles - There are so many cards out there that offer air miles (Avios) that it would be impossible to list them all. Look for cards that offer no foreign transaction fees as well so that you can travel abroad with a minimum of fees attached to your monetary transactions. You can sometimes convert the Avios to shopping rewards and that will also be one way to pay for gifts you might not want to spend actual money on. Remember that most rewards premium rewards credit cards come with annual fees that can balance out some of the deals you are getting. Do a credit cards comparison online and check not only the rewards, but the types of fees and finance charges associated with each credit card before making a final decision. Then, use the cards according to how they will give you the maximum benefit throughout the year. If you can't find just one card, there is no harm in putting more than one in your wallet to make use of the varied types of rewards programs out there.

Claire Moylan knows that for certain people, life without a range of premium credit cards in their wallets would be unthinkable. To learn more about the wide range of credit cards available check out the free information provided by uSwitch.com.