Upromise® and Saving Money for College

How often do you shop online, or dine out? Often? Occasionally? The point is…you do it, and you could be saving money for your child’s college education. Upromise offers a way for you to shop and save at the same time. With a network of over 70,000 retail stores, restaurants, and services; grocery & drugs stores; and online retailers, you are sure to find a way to save money for college.

Upromise was launched in April of 2001. Its mission is simple: “to make college more affordable for American families”. How? Well, everytime you make “eligible purchases” through the Upromise website or dine at one of the Upromise participating restaurants, you receive a percentage back of your purchases (we’ll call them rebates). Those rebates are pre-determined on the website, and the percentages vary from company to company. There’s no catch. It is free to join, and the rebates are paid by the participating company. In fact, many of them offer discounts as well; rebates are not secretly (in my experience) built into your purchases.

You register one or more credit, debit, and/or grocery cards so that Upromise can keep track of the purchases. Your progress is tracked through the website and is updated fairly often. The contributions that are approved are then deposited into a 529 plan (I use Vanguard) that you can setup through Upromise Investments.

There is a trick to making this a more successful undertaking. Network. By inviting friends and family to join Upromise, you can link grandma’s account activity to little Johnny’s account, and so on. Her purchases translate into rebates for her grandson…or granddaughter, but I guess her name wouldn’t be Johnny.

Mastercard recently announced a plan for financial institutions to offer cardholders a way to save for college. The first issuers for Upromise MasterCard Debit Rewards Program include BancorpSouth, BankAtlantic, BECU, and Provident Bank. For some time now, a Citi® Upromise® Card has been available to offer similar rewards.

With tuition costs rising (certainly outpacing inflation), this is a great way for you to help your children save now rather than having to worry about it later. Student loans are no fun and financial aid doesn’t always cover all of the expenses. Maybe your child will be like mine and become an elite athlete. Take a tour at Upromise today.

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