Is a Credit Card Cash Advance a Good Idea?

When you’re strapped for cash and still have some available credit on one of your credit cards, a credit card cash advance is one way to temporarily make ends meet. Considering the cost of a cash advance, you might question whether it’s such a good idea?

A cash advance fee is one of the costs of a credit card cash advance. Cash advance fees can be a percentage of your advance – typically between 1% and 4% of the amount you take out. Or, the fee could be a flat rate. Some credit cards use a combination of the two to come up with your cash advance fee. For example, you might pay $15 or 4% of the cash advance, whichever is greater.

When you use an ATM to take out a cash advance on your credit card, you’ll also pay an ATM fee to the bank who owns the machine.

The highest costs of all are the finance charges that are applied to cash advance balances. Different types of credit card balances typically have different interest rates. You might have one interest rate for purchases, another for balance transfers, and yet another for cash advances. Of all the interest rates, cash advance rates are the highest. This means you’ll have the highest finance charges on your cash advance.

Unlike purchases, you don’t get a grace period for cash advances, so interest starts accruing the day you take it out. You’ll pay interest on a cash advance even if you pay off the balance when your statement comes. Until you pay off the cash advance in full, your balance accrues monthly interest, making it harder to repay.

The way credit card companies apply payments to your credit card could mean your cash advance balance increases rather than decreases. When you have multiple types of balances on your credit card, your issuer probably applies your payment to the lowest interest rate balance first. Meanwhile, the highest interest rate balance (your cash advance) isn’t credited any payment at all until it’s the only balance you’re carrying.


If you want to take out a cash advance on your credit card, make sure you understand the cost. Use a credit card that currently has a $0 balance to keep your cash advance from growing out of control.

Major Changes to Credit Card Rules

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The Federal Reserve voted on December 18 to approve rules that would reform several unfair practices within the credit card industry. Some of the rules include:

· No interest rate increases during the first year of opening an account, unless the interest rate increase was disclosed when you opened the account. You can enjoy your interest rate for a full 12 months without having your credit card issuer increase your interest rate. The exception is when the lender told you your rate would increase when you opened your account. For example, you knowingly signed up for a credit card with a 6-month promotional rate.

· No interest rate charges on pre-existing credit card balances. If your interest rate increases, you can continue to pay your current balance at the lower interest rate. Only charges made after the interest rate increase will have the new interest rate.

· Credit card issuers must give a 45-day notice before increasing your interest rate. This is a drastic change over the current 15-day advance notice time period. The 45-day advanced-noticed includes penalty rate increases.

· Your minimum payment can be increased if you don’t make the minimum payment within 30 days of the due date.

· No more double billing cycle finance charges in which credit card issuers calculate your finance charge using an average of the current and previous month’s average daily balances. Under this method, you would end up paying interest on balances you’d already paid.

· Subprime credit cards can no longer charge fees that exceed 50% of the credit limit. Furthermore, the fees charged when the credit card is first opened can’t exceed 25% of the credit limit. Other fees must be spread evenly over a minimum of 5 billing cycles.

Although the rules make strides in protecting consumers from unscrupulous credit card issuers and their expensive practices, they won’t take effect until January 1, 2010. That gives credit card issuers plenty of time to wreak havoc on consumers.