Secured Credit Card is similar to a prepaid credit card since the funds you are using are actually yours and not the issuer of the credit card. Generally people who apply for secured credit card or prepaid credit card are people with poor credit or unemployed. Prepaid Credit Card spending limit is the amount of money you loaded to the card. There are no interest or finance charges on a prepaid card. With secured credit card, your credit line could be from 50% to 100% of your deposit depending on the institution giving you the secured credit. Therefore the company giving you the secured credit card has zero risk.

Secured credit card can be very beneficial because it gives you an opportunity to rebuild your credit history and you are able to make purchases just as if you had an unsecured credit card. Many companies require that you have a credit card to make purchases, such as car rental, airline tickets, etc. Ensure that the company issuing the secured credit, routinely reports customers’ payment history to any of the three main credit bureaus namely Experian, Equifax and Trans Union. This reporting to the credit bureaus will rebuild your credit history over time. Read the rest of this entry »

Entrepreneurs and small business owners who have incorporated their business have a special opportunity that no other individual or sole proprietor has. It’s the opportunity to start establishing business credit by building a business credit profile that is completely separate from a personal credit profile.

The main problem still facing today’s small business owner is fewer than 10 percent know about or truly understand how business credit is established and tracked-and how it affects their lives and businesses. Statistics even show that over 65% off all small businesses use credit cards on a regular basis; but the problem is less than half of those credit cards are actually in the business name. The others continue to use the owner’s personal credit cards for business transactions. Read the rest of this entry »

Bad credit for a self employed person is like adding fuel to an already ignited fire. Self employment itself is considered a bad credit for the purposes of lending. Bad credit history, which constitutes of County Court Judgements, Individual Voluntary Arrangements, and bankruptcy, further puts the lenders in a defensive mode. They often refuse loans to the self employed people. Alternatively, the loans lent to the self employed people are unreasonably termed, with the intention that borrowers will themselves back out from the loan deal.

But, do borrowers really back out through refusals or unreasonably termed loans? No! The need for funds pushes the self employed people to accede to the terms of the loan. However, there is bad credit loan for self employed instead, which can be used by them to raise funds more advantageously. Read the rest of this entry »