Credit Offer Online - Prepaid Student Credit Cards

Prepaid Student Credit Cards

If you have a child heading off to college and you're not sure of what their fiscal abilities are, prepaid student credit cards might be something to consider.

Teaching Financial Responsibility

When you're sending your kid off to college, there's a lot to think about besides how you're going to pay for books, tuition, room and board. For instance, what will you do when your student needs money? If he's got a part-time job, no worries. But some kids prefer not to work while in school. And contrary to parents' belief, kids don't spend all their money on beer and pizza. There are legitimate expenses like toiletries in addition to the beer and pizza. (Hey--we're just being honest.) Without limits, and with all the readily available offers for credit cards that kids see on campus all the time, they can easily get into a financial mess.

In an effort to prevent this, you might want to look into prepaid student credit cards. This is a credit card that you essentially "buy," meaning you load it up with say....$500-$1000. You tell your child what the limit on the card is, and that when it's gone, it's gone. And if they don't want to be embarrassed when making a purchase and the card is declined, they'll use it wisely. When they start buying things for themselves that they may not have bought themselves before, they realize how much things cost and how far money goes (or doesn't go). Prepaid student credit cards will teach them financial boundaries. At least we hope so.

Speaking of boundaries, prepaid student credit cards allow you to monitor where your child is spending money. If there are multiple purchases at bars, restaurants or liquor stores, you may want to have a talk with your child. If he's in a dorm, he's got meals covered. If he lives off-campus, he will need to learn how to cook to stretch his money. Bars and liquor stores? Well, let's face it. It's going to happen. What you do about it is up to you. You should be able to tell if there's a problem.

Using prepaid student credit cards prevents students from amassing large amounts of credit card debt. If you give your student a prepaid student credit card, you're teaching them to be smart about their money.

Disclaimer

Usually there's a small initial fee to get prepaid credit cards started, and there's usually a fee to reload too, but it's smaller than the fee to set one up. Perhaps when your student is home for the summer, he or she can get a job and reload the card themselves for the following semester. Prepaid cards allow your child to graduate from college with a degree, not with a mountain of debt. (Unless they have student loans. But that's a topic for another site.)