by Maxwell Payne

Created on: November 13, 2008   Last Updated: December 24, 2008

Many credit cards come with built in rewards programs. Generally, these credit card rewards programs offer a percentage back on every purchase in the form of points and in the case of cash rebate cards: cash back. Cash rebate cards are more commonly called cash back credit cards and fall under the area of rewards credit cards.

Most cash rebate credit cards like their rewards point counterparts give the holder around 1% cash rebate on all purchases made with the credit card. 1% is the most common percentage with some cards offering tiered earning levels or higher percentages back for certain purchases. Many of these rewards rebate cards offer access to exclusive bonus shopping sites. These sites link the cardholder to special links for many kinds of merchants through which they can get special deals and often a higher percentage of cash back on purchases done through the special link.

Bonus shopping websites aside, most cash rebate cards offer a flat 1 percent back on all purchases with some purchases falling under bonus categories that are usually eligible for between 2-5% back on those purchases. Cards such as American Express Blue offer the users up to 5% back on certain purchases with 1%-2% back on all other purchases. The catch with this offer is that the user must spend a certain amount, generally around 6,000 dollars a year on the card before the 5% kicks in.

Discover cards offer cardholders a tiered cash back/points program. After spending 2,500 dollars in a year, they move from 0.25% to 0.50% back. Once they reach the next level, it moves to 1% and so forth. Many high spenders benefit from this program as they easily reach the higher tiers over 2%. These numbers can always vary, though. Blue from American Express and Discover CashBack cards are two examples of tiered cash back earnings programs.

Chase offers a card called Chase Freedom, which offers a great example of ideal cash back card for low to moderate card users; even higher spending users may enjoy it. Cardholders earn 1% back from the first penny spent and earn 3% back (up to 600 dollar in spending per month) on their top 3 spending areas out of a possible 15 for that billing cycle.

Most of these programs offer the earlier mentioned bonus sites where cardholders can shop through special links that boost cash back percentages on those purchases anywhere from 2% to 20% back. Also, many cash rebate cards offer new cardholders a check for around 50 dollars after the first purchase and may also allow

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