Money Blue Book

Updated List Of The Best Restaurant Credit Card Offers For Eating And Dining Out

I wish I could be like a green garden plant and photosynthesize my food instead of having to buy it. I spend so much money eating out it’s sad. I eat lunch at work and usually spend up to $8 for a sandwich. Dinner usually involves whatever I pick up on the way home and it’s frequently $10 or more. Food in downtown Washington D.C. where I work can definitely get very expensive.

Luckily there are certain credit cards I can use to soften the financial blow by getting cash back or reward points for eating out. Most reward cards only give a measly 1% cash back, and many of the ones that offer a higher percentage back only offer it for purchases at fast food/takeout places. But there are a select few reward cards that offer a very impressive 3%-5% back for all restaurants, including fast food and even coffee shops! If you’re a student who eats out often, a young professional who dines out most of the time, or even a family minded foodie who enjoys fancy restaurants, you might benefit from having a utility credit card in your pocket that will allow you to earn rebate rewards and cash back discounts for such meal expenses.

Here Are The Best Reward and Cashback Credit Cards For Eating and Dining Out:

1) Citi Forward Card – Get 5% back at restaurants, fast food joints, coffee shops, and anywhere else you dine out. The high 5% reward rate also covers purchases made at book stores (includes Amazon.com), movie theaters, and music retailers. For everything else, you get 1% back. This card is one of the best reward credit card offers out there for frequent foodie types that eat out often and rack up large food expenses. Why not earn Citi ThankYou gift card rewards and Citi cash back while you’re at it? For a more in depth summary of the Citi Forward credit card’s impressive reward features, please see my Citi Forward review.

2) Citi mtvU Visa Card for Students – Earn 5% back at restaurants and anytime you eat out including fast food and coffee shops, bookstores (includes Amazon.com), movie theaters, with 1% back for everything else. With the Citi mtvU, you earn Citi Thank You Network rewards, which can be redeemed for rewards including gift cards and cash. If you’re a student, this is must have card since the reward benefits are truly one of a kind. It’s one of my favorite reward credit cards and my most frequently used one since I eat out so often.

To qualify for the card you have to be a student – either full time, part time, in community, college, or graduate school. Citibank may ask you to verify your student status but that’s not always the case. Back when I applied, they required me to send them my tuition bill receipt and a copy of my student ID with the current semester sticker attached.

3) American Express True Earnings Card From Costco – This card is brought to you by Costco and is meant for Costco warehouse club members. This card offers you 3% cash back for restaurant dining and eating out, 3% for gas, 2% for traveling, and 1% for everything else including Costco purchases. The card comes with no annual fee if you have a paid Costco membership. Rebates are awarded in the form of an in-store coupon redeemable for cash or merchandise at any U.S. Costco warehouse.

4) Chase Business Rebate Card – Earn 3% cash back at restaurants, gas stations, office supply stores, and home improvement stores. You earn 1% for everything else. There is currently a promotional offer of 0% APR interest for all purchases and a 0% balance transfer promotion for 15 months.

5) FNBO Business Edition Plus Visa Card – Earn 3% reward rebates at restaurants (3 points for every $1 you spend) with this promising credit card offer from the First National Bank of Omaha. Cardholders also get the high 3% reward credit card rate for purchases at gas stations, office supply stores, and home improvement stores, as well as 1% back for everything else.

6) Amex TrueEarnings Business Card From Costco – The TrueEarnings Business Card from American Express offers everything the Costco consumer version offers, like 3% cash back for restaurants, 2% for traveling, and 1% for everything else including Costco, except it has a higher cash back rewards percentage for gas at 5%.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 3rd, 2007 at 11:57 pm and is filed under Credit Cards, Deals and Offers, Shopping, Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.