New Credit Card for Annual Season Ticket Purchase

kg87

Hello everyone,

I have a quick question regarding which credit card would be the best for purchasing a new Annual Season Ticket I need to purchase at the start of 2015. The cost of my ticket will be £4,200(ish) and I have looked at the best cashback credit card deals on the MSE Website.

I think the AMEX Platinum Cashback card comes out on top but wasn't sure about a couple of things and was hoping someone could help.

They offer 5% cashback during your first three months on up to £2,500 in purchases, followed by 1.25% cashback on virtually everything you buy.

Does this mean I would get 5% cashback on £2,500 and 1.25% cashback on the remaining 1.25%, or would I only get 5% cashback on the first £2,500 and nothing more as it would be part of the same transaction?

Also, if the cashback paid monthly or yearly? I had a look but couldn't find this information anywhere.

Thanks in advance!

thebritishbloke

You'd get 5% on the first £2,500 and 1.25% on the remaining £1,700.

p00hsticks

kg87 wrote: »

Also, if the cashback paid monthly or yearly? I had a look but couldn't find this information anywhere.

It's paid annually on the anniversary of when you took out the card. Note that if you haven't earned the minimum caskback amount during the year (currently £25 I think), the cashback balance accumulated so far is simply wiped on this date and you start again from zero.

kg87 wrote: »

I have a quick question regarding which credit card would be the best for purchasing a new Annual Season Ticket I need to purchase at the start of 2015. The cost of my ticket will be £4,200(ish) and I have looked at the best cashback credit card deals on the MSE Website.

As an aside, if you are talking about a UK rail ticket, and you mean the very start of 2015, bear in mind that fares increase at the start of the year. You could save a considerable amount of money by purchasing (and then renewing) your season ticket at the end of December rather than the start of January

kg87

thebritishbloke wrote: »

You'd get 5% on the first £2,500 and 1.25% on the remaining £1,700.

Thanks for the quick response.

p00hsticks wrote: »

As an aside, if you are talking about a UK rail ticket, and you mean the very start of 2015, bear in mind that fares increase at the start of the year. You could save a considerable amount of money by purchasing (and then renewing) your season ticket at the end of December rather than the start of January

Thank you for the advice. I'm aware of the price rise in January, however my company will be reimbursing me for the ticket as part of a relocation expense so this isn't a huge concern to me.

Nick_C

There is no guarantee that the credit limit will cover the cost of your season ticket. I've found cashback credit cards in the past have given me low limits to avoid having to pay out too much!

kg87

Nick_C wrote: »

There is no guarantee that the credit limit will cover the cost of your season ticket. I've found cashback credit cards in the past have given me low limits to avoid having to pay out too much!

Good point Nick. Thanks for flagging. With this in mind, would it be better going for the Preferred Rewards Gold Card, which is a charge card and has no preset limit?

King_Of_Fools

kg87 wrote: »

Good point Nick. Thanks for flagging. With this in mind, would it be better going for the Preferred Rewards Gold Card, which is a charge card and has no preset limit?

Although it has no preset limit it does have a variable limit that starts off low until they work out what type of spender you are.

redux

Try another approach to the season ticket.

As well as weekly and monthly, you can get periods of a bit longer than a month.

So buy to start on a Monday and finish on a Friday, thus you are getting 5 weeks travel for the cost of a month plus 2 or 3 days, but also sometimes add a week or two to fit around bank holidays and your own holidays.

Like this, you can still cover a year for the cost of about 10 and a half months, and not have to borrow up front.

Edit: when I wrote this I hadn't noticed your later post about the employer reimbursing. I imagine they'd prefer the single transaction to administer. But I'll leave it here in case it might still be interesting.