When you operate a small business, you have to take care to present an image of yourself and your business that is conducive to positive and profitable relationships with all of your clients. One of the ways that you can do this (but which most business people aren’t aware of) is to pay careful attention to what your clients know about your business credit cards. You may be thinking that they shouldn’t know anything at all about your business credit cards but that’s not true; they should know limited information that can be useful to improving your business relationship with them.

One of the most important things that clients should know about your business credit cards is simply that you have them. Of course, you don’t need to go flashing the credit cards around but if you’re in a position where you have to pay for something in front of a client (a shared lunch, for example) then you should take care to use your business credit cards instead of either cash or personal credit cards. The reason for this is that it reflects positively on your professionalism that you have and use credit cards specifically designed for the business.

Another important thing that clients should be aware of is the way that you use business credit cards to improve the lives of others. For example, many businesses opt to get a green credit card or a charity rewards cards. These are credit cards that give back to a non-profit organization every time that you spend money on the card. These are things that clients are going to appreciate because they show your commitment to the world around you. Ultimately this is a benefit to you. If you use one of these types of business credit cards (and you should) it is completely appropriate to mention it as a giving-back feature of the business whenever you write about that topic in newsletters or email announcements. This is also something that you can mention on a page of your website which discusses your contributions to various causes. These types of feel-good things are great for business and using the business credit card to enhance this image is an easy way to boost your clients’ loyalty.

Of course, there are definitely things about your business credit card that your clients shouldn’t know. They shouldn’t know how many credit cards you have or what your outstanding debt is on those credit cards. Basically, your clients have no business knowing the details of your finances whether those details are positive or negative. It is bad form to share this information and it can lead to various kinds of trouble for you. When you are working to build up the image that you have in the eyes of clients and potential clients, you want to pay attention to your use of credit cards around them and make sure that you reveal certain useful information about the use of those credit cards without going so far as to reveal the financial details of your business.

College students often find themselves in a financially difficult position during the summer months. They may be taking summer classes but not getting as much financial aid as they do during the normal semester and are therefore struggling to meet their financial commitments. Alternatively, they may not be in school and trying to find a short-term job for the summer but the jobs that are available for just a few months at a time are rarely ideal and often don’t pay well enough to cover living expenses as well as general bills. This puts many college students in an awkward financial position in terms of dealing with their student credit cards.

There are two general issues that come up for college students which relate to the use of student credit cards during the summer:

1. Deciding to use the credit cards to afford life during the summer. Many college students don’t want to get a job during the summer months and don’t have enough money to pay their rent and living expenses since there is no money coming in from financial aid. These students decide to use the credit card to pay for general expenses throughout the summer and tend to rack up excessive credit card bills as a result.

2. Inability to pay credit card bills during the summer months. Because there isn’t that money coming in from financial aid and school loan assistance, many students find that their ability to make timely payments towards their credit card debt is made difficult during the summer months. This can result in late or missed payments and damage to the student’s credit.

Dealing with both of these issues means taking responsibility for using credit cards responsibly during the summer, something that many college students would prefer not to do because it feels a whole lot easier to ignore the problem until that first student loan check comes in the fall.

The main thing that college students need to realize is that irresponsible use of credit cards during the summer months lasts a lot longer than just the duration of the summer. Students who rack up a lot of debt during the summer will struggle throughout the upcoming school year to pay back that debt. Students who fail to make credit card payments in the summer will find that their credit suffers as a result even after they start to make timely payments in the fall.

The smart solution for most college students is to implement a summer budget, reduce spending as much as possible, get at least a part-time job to pay for expenses and to make sure to make at least the minimum payment on credit cards during the summer months. This takes some will power and a sense of responsibility – after all, most college kids would prefer to just enjoy their summer vacation – but it’s something that is financially a good plan to follow. Students who are able to do so are generally going to be more financially stable and satisfied in the long run than those students who use summer to get themselves into a financial mess.

When you sign up for a new credit card, you typically receive an offer of additional cards for other people that you’d like to allow to use your account. It is common for people to get an additional card for a spouse. It is also common for employers to allow multiple employees permission to use a business card. This type of situation can facilitate purchases because the card holder doesn’t have to be the one running around doing all of the buying. However, it also poses risks, especially when you’re talking about allowing employees to make purchasing decisions in a business. As a result, it is important to be cautious about who is allowed to use the business credit card.

A small business should typically have no more than three people who are allowed to use the business credit card. The main credit card holder will be the owner of the business. If there is a co-owner, business partner or top-level manager for the business then it is acceptable to get an additional card for this individual since he or she is likely to already be involved in making decisions about purchases for the business. Finally, there should be someone allowed to use the card to make general business purchases that don’t require extensive owner approval; this is usually a secretary or office manager. You want to have someone that’s able to run to the store and buy toilet paper for the business bathroom without getting your approval.

Some small business owners opt to refuse to allow a second or third person to have a card on the business account. They deal with the whole toilet paper problem by having a petty cash drawer in the office. In general, this is not a recommended course of action. For one thing, it’s actually significantly easier to steal from the business if you have access to cash than it is if you have to use a credit card to make purchases. Another reason is that it’s easiest to keep track of business expenses for the purposes of accounting and taxes when everyone making purchases for the business is using the business credit card account.

At the other extreme are business owners who allow practically anyone in the company to make use of the business credit card. This is especially common in small business offices where everyone is working together closely and handling multiple tasks for the business. This is also a flawed approach. For one thing, the more people you allow to use a business card, the more risks that you’re taking with the company’s money. Additionally, it gets confusing for a business when many different people are taking it upon themselves to make purchases on behalf of the business. They may be legitimate purchases but if they’re not organized then they can be wasteful.

The smart business owner will implement a system of business credit card use that keeps risks to the company low while increasing business efficiency. This means allowing at least one but no more than two staff members to use the business credit card. Make sure to also check with the credit card company about insurance and protections for the business credit card. Capped spending limits for specific employees, online user-based usage tracking and liability insurance are all available on many business credit cards.

Balance transfers on credit cards can be a great thing. They allow you to consolidate debt and lock in a low balance transfer rate for a certain period of time (usually six months to a year). However, many people get trapped by the credit card companies when it comes to balance transfers and they fail to take proper advantage of the benefits of the offer because they don’t realize that the offer requires them to take certain actions. Most people know about the major things to look out for with a balance transfer but there are some hidden things that many people aren’t aware of. One of the most common traps is that people will make purchases on the same card that had a balance transfer and create problems with their interest and payments as a result.

Typically people engage in a balance transfer because they want to lower their interest rate. The ultimate goal is to be able to pay off a big balance more quickly because the money is going to the principle instead of to the interest. For example, if you lock in a zero percent interest rate for twelve months on a balance transfer then you have twelve months during which the payments you make will be going to pay off the principle. This is obviously a good financial move and the benefits of it can outweigh some of the problems. For example, most people know to look at the fee that’s charged for a balance transfer transaction; it’s often worth it to pay the fee because of the savings in interest that you’ll get over the lifetime of the balance transfer offer.

However, there is a catch when it comes to balance transfers and it often causes problems for people in regards to paying down the principle on their debt. The catch is that the balance transfer rate applies only to balance transfers and not to other transactions on the card. You may not think that this is a big deal if the transaction APR is lower than your other cards but the way that payments are processed could cause you to lose out on the benefits of the balance transfer. That’s because your payments will go towards paying the higher APR first.

For example, let’s say that your zero percent balance transfer card also offers a 9.99% rate on purchase. That’s a good rate that may be better than your other cards so you go ahead an make several purchases on the card. The card now carries two different interest rates – 0% on the balance transfer and 9.99% on the purchases. The problem is that your payment is going to first go to pay off the amount that’s got a 9.99% interest rate. So you’re going to be making payments that cover only your purchases and you won’t be paying down the amount of debt that you have on the balance transfer. This can still be a smart move if you’re seeking to delay making payments on the balance transfer amount but it’s not a smart way to think about actually paying off your debt.

The more credit cards that you have, the harder it is going to be to keep them all organized. Failure to keep your finances organized can lead to making late payments and going over the allotted limit on your cards. These things cause you to incur fees which can put you in a financial bind and make it difficult to continue making payments on any of your cards. This causes a vicious cycle in which you regularly rack up additional credit card debt that you can’t pay. It is imperative that you reduce the number of credit cards that you have and then keep organized records that will let you manage these cards and ultimately pay off your debt.

The first thing that you should do is to reduce the number of credit cards that you have by using balance transfers and debt consolidation credit cards. The goal that you should aim for at first is to reduce the number of credit cards that you have by fifty percent. If you have twenty cards, get it down to ten. If you have eight cards, get it down to four. Of course, make sure that you make smart choices about balance transfer rates and fees so that this consolidation doesn’t cost you too much.

The next thing that you’ll want to do is to create a spreadsheet on your computer that shows you all of the information about each card. It should include the following information:

- The name of the card

- The outstanding balance on the card

- The card’s credit limit

- The total available credit on the card

- The interest rate on the card

- The minimum monthly payment on the card

- The date payments are due each month

- Additional notes such as when low-interest rates are set to end and what they’ll be after that

You will use this spreadsheet to organize your payments as well as to start paying down on the debt. The first thing to do is to use the sort function on the spreadsheet to sort the information by the date that payment is due each month. This will clearly show you when you’re going to need to pay how much in order to avoid late fees. If possible, schedule your checking account to automatically make these payments for you so that there are no late fees. If not, print out a list of the dates that payments are due and the minimum payment due so that you can send the checks in a timely manner.

If the dates are varied and it’s too confusing for you, you can request that each credit card company change your payment date so that it falls on a specific day. Many people find that it’s helpful to schedule half of their payments due on the 1st and half on the 15th of each month to stay organized and keep in line with their incoming paychecks.

Once you’ve gotten monthly payments straightened out, use the information on your spreadsheet to see which cards should be paid off first. Those with the highest balances and those with the highest interest rates should take priority. Pay only the minimum on other cards while devoting extra money to paying off these cards one at a time.

One of the most important things that you can do for yourself as a business owner or business professional is to get your finances organized. The only way to move forward financially is to make sure that you are earning more in profit than you are spending. Whether you are responsible for the entire operation of a business or you just want to maximie your own earnings as a business professional by taking advantage of all of the financial savings tax breaks that are available to you, you have to first have the knowledge of where your money is going each month. The easiest way to do that is to streamline all expenditures on to a business credit card.

Sure, there are many different accounting software programs out there which are designed to show you what your monthly expenses are. Those are great, but it’s actually a lot simpler to get organized with your professional finances than you might have thought. The key is to use a great business credit card to keep track of all expenditures. Separating business from personal expenses by putting all business expenses on this one card will allow you to easily see the exact amount of money that is going towards business expenses each month. Furthermore, a great credit card will show you specifically what types of expenditures are being made so that you can immediately see the areas in which you need to cut back on spending.

The first thing that you’ll want to do when getting a new business credit card is to transfer all of the outstanding balances that you have for the business on to this card. This will show you the financial deficit that you are working with. This will help you to see what needs to be done to deal with your existing professional debt. Besides, it is great incentive to get you motivated to start having better spending habits. Of course, you’ll want to get a low balance transfer rate to the card in order to make this a smart financial move.

The next thing that you’ll want to do is to learn about the tracking systems that are automatically available on your card. Many business credit cards will separate expenses in to categories for you, although some require that you set up the categorical information yourself through the bank’s online system. Through this type of automatic tracking, your credit card bill will automatically reveal to you where you are spending your money. Expense categories may include office rent, utilities, phone and other service bills, office supplies, business travel and so on. If your credit card won’t do this for you, you should sit down with your bill and a highlighter pen each month and figure it out yourself.

By tracking the amount of money that you are spending in different areas of the business, it becomes easy to identify where you can cut back on spending. This helps you to create a manageable budget that will ultimately increase the amount of profit that you are earning. For example, if your categorical analysis shows that you’re spending fifty percent of your total bill each month on business travel, you may wish to assess whether the expenditure is worth the profit gained. Track your spending this way over a period of at least six months to get a good idea of what your patterns are in order to correct them.

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