Chris has a Starwood Preferred Guest Business Card from American Express.  He received a notice from American Express with his November statement. In the notice, American Express told all of its OPEN small business credit card holders that it will no longer process balance transfers or convenience checks.

Effective immediately, Balance Transfers and Convenience Checks against OPEN Credit Card accounts will no longer be accepted or available. This includes requests made by phone, online or through the use of Balance Transfer, Convenience Checks and Cash checks.

This movement is confirmed by American Express due to the low profitability during the financial crisis. All small business onwners should make some changes according to the latest news. American Express small business cards are no longer available to get cash for your business.

Citi works together with Firethorn Holdings to introduce the new cool Citi Mobile for Cards hoping it will be an advanced mobile solution that allows Citi credit card customers to quickly, easily and securely access real-time credit card account information on their mobile phones.

According to the website, Citi Mobile for Cards is now available to AT&T subscribers as a part of AT&T Mobile Banking service, and to Verizon Wireless customers who download and use the free mobile banking application on Get It Now. A list of available devices above mentioned AT&T and Verizon can be found here.

The Citi Mobile for Cards can offer card members following features:

• Real-time balances
• Available for purchase
• Recent transaction history
• Rewards programs information

To enroll in Citi Mobile for Cards and download the application at no charge, visit http://www.CitiMobile.CitiCards.com.

Credit score is a very important number in your daily life. If you have an excellent credit score., you might can get low mortgage rate, or low interest on your personal loans. You might even get great balance transfer offers from credit card companies. Sometimes the credit score will also affect your insurance rate! There are many factors that might influence your credit score.

Among the factors that influence your credit score the credit inquiries seem to be an important factor. Because the credit inquiries will not only lower your score but also give the creditors a sign that you might be in financial trouble and want to get a lot of credit from credit grantors. Actually there are two different types of credit inquiry and they have different effect on your credit report.

A soft pull (soft inquiry, soft credit check) doesn’t show up on your credit report — though they are tracked in the credit history that you see when you check your own credit. This inquiry is only visible to you. Thus the soft pulls will not affect your credit score. The soft pulls are done when the credit check is not initiated by you. For example, a credit card company wants to check your credit report to see which credit card offer is suitable to you. In this case, a soft inquiry will appear but it will not affect your credit score.

A hard pull (hard inquiry, hard credit check) occurs when a lender or credit card issuer checks your credit report as part of an application process. This is a credit application process that initiated by yourself. Other creditors are authorized to check your credit history to determine whether or not to grant your application. All the creditors can see the hard pulls (within 24 months) thus your credit score will be lower whenever a hard credit check occurs.

Yes, it’s a very obvious fact—credit card issuers have begun to review your credit card account and begun to reduce your credit card lines or even close your account. Many readers have reported that their credit card issuers like American Express, Chase and Citi have accessed their credit report in the past months and made some changes on their credit card account.

Following is some examples from my friends:

My friend John has a Blue from American Express Card which was opened in 2006. Previously, the credit limit was $12,700 but now the limited has been reduced to $4,600.

My friend Chris has a Citi Dividend Platinum Select MasterCard with original credit limit of $11,000. Now the new credit limit is $6,000.

My colleague Brad has a Starwood Preferred Guest Card from American Express with original credit limit of $14,200. But now the new credit limit is only $3,200.

The article by Nancy Trejos at Washington Post titled “Less Power to Purchase” indicates that credit card issuers have reduced credit lines on their cards recently. She wrote: “The retrenchment, which follows years of lavishing Americans with offers and ever-increasing limits, is squeezing consumers at a time when they have already lost other avenues for borrowing, such as home equity lines of credit.”

There are also many cases in that article on how people’s credit card limits were reduced. You should watch out your mailbox from now on.

According to the latest New York Times report, Citi will raise credit card rate in 2009. If you have a Citi credit card, you would be expected to receive the notice of a 2-3% rate increase on your November statement.

However, as the article pointed out, by doing this Citigroup is breaking the promise they made to Congress in 2007 that they would not arbitrarily raise rates on accounts—which may be why they’re offering a fairly lenient opt-out policy.

Yes, Citi got a huge amount of money from the federal government and then it will increase the rate to cover its loss in the credit crisis. I believe no one would like to see this happens to them.

Look out your mail from Citi recently, there will be a notice about your rate change. The best way to avoid this is to apply for another credit card from other credit card issuers like BOA, Chase, American Express and Discover Card.

The Discover Business Credit Card is offering $100 sign up bonus right now. Facing the tight financial situation, it’s really not an easy job for Discover Card to keep offering great sign up bonus for its potential card members. The $100 bonus offer is available to all of new Discover Business Card members. Furthermore, this card also offers 0% AOR on purchases for up to 12 months!

» 0% APR on purchases for 12 months
» Up to 5% cash back on select purchases
» No annual fee (not typical for a business card)

Keep in mind that anyone can apply for a business credit card. Simply enter you SSN if they ask for a taxpayer ID, and use your personal name as you business name.

Safeway just released a new promotion which enables Safeway coub card members to save money on gasoline purchase by buying eligible amount of gift cards from now through 12/25/2008.

This promotion is just in time for the holiday shopping. And according to Diane Dietz, Safeway Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, “This is the best fuel discount program in the marketplace.”

Here is how it works:

Simply use your Club Card to get a 10¢ off per gallon PowerPump Reward for every $100 you spend on groceries or gift cards. Your Rewards add up, so it’s easy to earn 10¢, 20¢, 30¢, 40¢ or more per gallon in no time! Purchases can be made in a single or multiple transactions. You also get a 10¢ off per gallon Reward for every second prescription filled during the same calendar quarter. Eligible purchases towards $100 exclude pharmacy prescription purchases and co-pays. You can buy more than 100 gift card brands at Safeway. It is a great opportunity to save money during this shopping season. But you should be aware that your existing gas rewards expire on the last day of each calendar quarter: 3/31, 6/30, 9/30, 12/31.

Furthermore, Customers outside of the vicinity of a Safeway fuel station will receive double gas rewards to use at a BP or ARCO station through year end.

More information can be found at Safeway.com.

Nowadays most of credit card issuers are tightening their credit limit. Recently, most credit card issuers cut the rate of approval for new credit card applications, remove cap on balance transfer, and reduce the period of 0% APR offers. But Bank of America offers some cards with excellent balance transfer offers. If you are short of money, you might consider these offers. It’s really rare to see these offers.

All of the following cards are offering 0% APR on balance transfer for up to 15 months:

Bank of America WorldPoints Platinum Plus MasterCard

Visa Signature WorldPoints Rewards ($25 sign up bonus)

Cash Rewards Platinum Plus MasterCard