Pragmatic Finance

The Citi mtvU Card is quickly becoming one of my favorite cards. It is a student card that gives you 5% back at restaurants, bookstores, movie theaters, record stores, and video rental stores in the form of 5 thank you points and 1% back on other purchases. Even better, any purchase at a merchant who classifies themselves under one of those categories will net you 5 points, even if it really isn’t say a restaurant or bookstore. For example, you can receive 5% back at Amazon.com, fast food places, and even some bars. It also gives 10% back on purchases from the mtv shop but I doubt I’ll be using that.

This card is supposed to be for students only but they did not make me verify that I attended the college I go to. I am guessing that if you are young, have student loans, and nothing raises a red flag on your credit report you will get approved without needing any verification. I have read that you can be denied for having over 10k in revolving, ie credit card debt so might want to avoid the 0% Balance Transfer game when you want to apply for it.

Speaking of which, it has 0% apr on purchases AND balance transfers for 6 months. I took out a bt for about 90% of the credit limit and left the rest for purchases. Has worked out great. And of course there is no annual fee. If you apply, do so through CardOffers to get a $40 bonus from them.

There are also some other ways to get points. You get 25 bonus points per month as long as you pay your bill ontime and don’t go over your credit limit. If you want to deal with the hassel of sending in your grades you can receive points for that as well. The scale is:

You can download the mtvU grade submission form and send it with a copy of your grades. I haven’t tried it yet so I can’t tell you how easy it is or if you have to send an official transcript. So far I have had the card for one statement and gotten 5% back all my dining, including fast food and one bar. I even got 50 points instead of 25 under the description of “Good customer bonus.” I don’t know if thats a mistake but I am not going to complain. Combining this with the Citi Dividend Platinum Select and Discover Card get more program you can get 5% back on a very wide selection of purchases.