BillShrink, a company that seeks to help people save money on everyday services, now offers information on one of the biggest money drains around — your credit card.
The Menlo Park, Calif. startup began by providing advice about which cell phone plan best fits your needs (less useful for a schmuck like me who’s locked into an AT&T iPhone deal). Adding advice about which credit card to use is an obvious next step.
It’s hard to judge the accuracy of BillShrink’s advice after a quick test run, but I can say that the process is fast and easy, and could potentially save me hundreds of dollars. I was also more willing to use BillShrink’s service because it only asked me for basic data — the closest thing to sensitive information that I had to provide was a rough estimate of my credit score.
Basically, you just answer a few questions like what card you use, how much money you normally spend a month and what kinds of expenses you use your card for. Then BillShrink provides you with a list of cards that you should consider switching to. In my case, BillShrink says an American Express card could earn me an additional $624 over three years and, of course, provides a handy link to apply for the card. The list is fairly customizable, too — you can change the time period that you’re interested in (i.e., whether you want to save the most money over one year or five years), or the kinds of rewards that you’re interested in. The company says there are more than 200 major credit cards in its database now, and it can also notify users when particularly suitable cards are added.
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The Bessemer Venture Partners-backed company launched in April, and it’s moving in the right direction. It will be interesting to see what other information it adds in the coming months — saving hundreds of dollars on a credit card is pretty nice, but saving hundreds of dollars added up over several spending areas could be insanely useful.
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