A few small financial missteps can have a huge impact on credit ratings. If you have a poor credit score, then you may find it difficult to get an unsecured credit card. Credit One® Unsecured credit card is an alternative to a secured credit card, where your refundable deposit acts as your credit limit.
Benefits received upon approval
When you are approved for the Credit One® Unsecured credit card you can earn a 1% cash back on all purchases. Credit One® has multiple reward programs and you can be approved for any one of them. The difference between the rewards programs is that some may have additional categories when compared to others. If you apply for a Nascar card, then you receive cash back benefits related to NASCAR purchases.
This card has an annual fee of $75, which will be deducted immediately from your available credit limited: If you are approved for $500 then $75 will be deducted and the amount available to you would be $425.
From the second year, the annual fee may be charged at once or Credit One® can split into twelve equal amounts and the charge will be applied to your account each month. The second-year annual fee can vary between $0-$99.
Credit One® offers cardholders the flexibility of selecting a payment due date once you are approved for a credit card. The user can select a due date six days prior or post the assigned due date. The due date can be modified once every six months.
The cash back which is earned is credited back into the account in the form of a statement credit. The rewards can be used to reduce the balance due, however, they are not considered as a payment. While paying your balance back in full is recommended, in case that is not an option a minimum payment is a must. Credit One® Unsecured credit card has a high APR and a non-payment can cause high-interest accumulation.
In case you notice an unusual charge or activity on your card, you won’t be held responsible if you immediately report it to Credit One®. Zero fraud liability protects you against fraudulent transactions
Credit Score Management
You can find out about your credit score for free by signing up for online account access with Credit One® and view your Experian ScoreX PLUS score. This is not your FICO score, but the score is based on the Experian ratings.
Drawbacks
No Grace Period: All users who want to apply for Credit One® can check if they pre-qualify for this card before accepting the terms and conditions. While reviewing the terms it is important to check if the offer rolled out to you includes a grace period or not. If there is no grace period, then you start to incur interest the moment the purchase is posted to your account.
Foreign Transaction Fee Applied: A secured credit card from Capital One or Discover has no foreign transaction fee but with this card, you may be charged $1 or 3% of each purchase in U.S dollars, whichever amounts greater.
High APR: The unsecured Credit One® card APR percentage rate ranges between 20.24% to 26.24% and based on the individual creditworthiness you may be offered a percentage. If your aim is to rebuild credit then carrying interest on a month to month basis would not be productive towards reaching your goal, especially if you are assigned a high rate of interest.
No Credit Limit Increase: Unlike Capital One which tells the user that there is a possibility of credit limit increase when applied for a secured card or unsecured card as Quicksilver®One, Credit One® does not specify what actions a new user can take by which they could be considered for a credit limit increase on this unsecured card.
When rebuilding your FICO score your payment history and your credit utilization plays a key role in score improvement. If you use less than 30% percent of the credit limit assigned to you then you would be considered good at credit management and it improves your score. Similarly, paying a portion of your balance before the statement closing date will also get reported as low credit utilization and you can pay the remaining balance back in full before the payment due date to avoid any late fees. In order to do this, you must look at your billing statement and understand the billing cycle.
Even though there are multiple drawback to this card, a responsible usage and management of the Credit One® Unsecured credit card can be effective in raising your credit score.
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