Credit Card for Student with Seasonal Work

YorkBrucie

We are a little old-school and only make online payments using a credit card as to not expose our current account unnecessarily.
We want the same for our son, but he's a college student who can only work through the holidays so not earning £10k pa which seems to be a threshold for cards.
Is there a card on the market that would accept him?  Preferably one that doesn't charge foreign transaction fees for when he wants to go travelling.

Isthisforreal99

Does he have a student current account? A few student account providers offer a credit card for students. That may be your best starting point.

CliveOfIndia

In terms of "travel" cards, there's an MSE article that should give you a good starting point: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/credit-cards/travel-credit-cards/

Whether he'd be accepted for any of those cards will be down to each individual lender's eligibility criteria.

Aside from that, the comment by the previous poster is good advice.

YorkBrucie said:

We are a little old-school and only make online payments using a credit card as to not expose our current account unnecessarily.

I do understand your concerns, but do remember that you're pretty well protected against fraudulent transactions anyway - whether made by debit card, credit card or directly through your bank account.

MyRealNameToo

YorkBrucie said:

We are a little old-school and only make online payments using a credit card as to not expose our current account unnecessarily.

Not sure thats "old school". My spending debit card account typically has about £100 in it, my largest credit card has a £35,000 limit. Now dont want fraud to happen on either but its clear which one could cause much more damage were someone to run amok with it... its not old school to hope they get access to the one with 350x more money for them to access.  Would imagine most people have higher credit limits than cash in the bank of their current account. 

YorkBrucie said:

Is there a card on the market that would accept him?  Preferably one that doesn't charge foreign transaction fees for when he wants to go travelling.

Best chance is their student account as many offer a student credit card but its unlikely to be fee free overseas. Does it need to be credit though? There are several debit cards if he doesnt need the credit line and it being a separate account limits exposure to whatever cash he puts in the account. 

flaneurs_lobster

Elsewhere I've suggested the Chase current account (& their debit card) as something suitable as a travel card. 

Just load it with cash as required.

WillPS

MyRealNameToo said:

YorkBrucie said:

We are a little old-school and only make online payments using a credit card as to not expose our current account unnecessarily.

Not sure thats "old school". My spending debit card account typically has about £100 in it, my largest credit card has a £35,000 limit. Now dont want fraud to happen on either but its clear which one could cause much more damage were someone to run amok with it... its not old school to hope they get access to the one with 350x more money for them to access.  Would imagine most people have higher credit limits than cash in the bank of their current account. 

I'd contend that a fraudster can do any amount of damage on a credit card and I would expect every penny of it to be taken care of by the issuer, with no detrimental impact to me while they figure it out, whereas a fraudster who has spent the money on a debit card could potentially leave me penniless for a while.

Also a student is far more likely to have a 3 figure credit limit to a 5 figure one!

YorkBrucie said:

We are a little old-school and only make online payments using a credit card as to not expose our current account unnecessarily.
We want the same for our son, but he's a college student who can only work through the holidays so not earning £10k pa which seems to be a threshold for cards.
Is there a card on the market that would accept him?  Preferably one that doesn't charge foreign transaction fees for when he wants to go travelling.

TSB and HSBC are the two banks still offering a student-focussed credit card, in each case for customers with a matching student current account only. Neither offer 0 FX, but your son could potentially use Curve to workaround that if accepted.

Your son could also try a comparison service to see if his income is sufficient for any 'mainstream' offerings, but I wouldn't expect much.

bdl23xx

I don't know if it's too late but my daughter has a student account with HSBC and they give a credit card with £500 starting limit. You just have to get your student loan paid in to qualify.