<p>What would be a good average amount to put on a student's Carolina Card. I saw in a recent USC publication that an average amt is $855-$1640. I would love anyone's opinion. And will any surplus be credited to the next semester?</p>
<p>Well at the school where my S goes a lot of the neighborhood places off campus accept his card, restaurants, gas stations, etc. So I put money knowing he can use it to buy a pizza or gas.
At USC it is only accepted on campus. $800 seems like a lot of money to me for the bookstore and laundry. I just put $150 on D card and will monitor it on VIP to see when she really needs more. You can add to it and it is available pretty quick. IMHO and in the case of my D…the more $$$$ given the more she will spend. So $150 on the Carolina plus a weekly allowance I will advance to her bank account which she can access with her debit card. As I say…“It’s only money”…lol…</p>
<p>The Carolina Card can be used for lots of things…the bookstore (need a printer cartridge and don’t have a ride to Office Depot?), Health Center fees and Prescriptions (They do not file insurance - you pay and file yourself, although the prices are very reduced), tickets to shows and activities, parking tickets, copies, laundry (I think it’s 75 cents per load for the washer or dryer), snack machines (in this hot weather, my son gets several sodas a day at $1.25 and snacks can run close to $1.00 each.), extra purchases at the dining hall, etc. When you pay the spring housing sign-up fee, the Carolina Card can also be used for that.
The third week my son was at school, someone stole his bookbag and he had to rebuy all his books right away because he was in the middle of projects and assignments - you never know what is going to come up.<br>
If you reserve your books through the bookstore, they require that you have enough money on the Card to cover the books before they process the order. The money is deducted from the card. Then they set up a tent outside the bookstore, and you just show your Carolina Card and pick up your books. Of course, the bookstore and other bookstores accept checks and debit cards, but you’re still spending the money.
This is just our experience, and others may be very different, but we have found those estimates on the publication to be right on target. Books (used, reserved from the bookstore) usually run $400 - $600. If you buy your books elsewhere, you need to deduct about $450 from those estimates for Carolina Cash. With the campus spread out, and long walks across campus from class to class, lots of sodas and snacks get consumed. Some of the laundry machines take quarters, but most use the Card.
Any money put on the Carolina Card is never lost. It carries over from semester to semester and year to year. When you graduate, you can request a refund of any balance left.
If you want to start with a low amount of money on the card, it’s very easy to make deposits. We go under my son’s VIP account and “Show me Carolina Card” and then you can make a deposit onto the Carolina Cash from a debit card or credit card. The money will then be available to the student on the Carolina Card within the half hour, from 7 AM to 1 AM, 7 days a week. You can also phone in deposits, although I have never used that option.</p>
<p>wahine
it depends on what your student is using the card for…if they will pay for books with it, they will need more but as SueC said its very easy to add $$ to the card via VIP…except then your student needs to give you access to the VIP account password they set up.
Be careful…there are different components to the card. Dining $$ is just that…it can only be used for dining. Carolina Cash can be used for anything…copies in the library,laundry machines,bookstore including starbucks,etc… including the dining venues so I always felt it was better to put the $$ on there instead,even though they may lose out on some dining deals along the way…
Carolina Cash carries overyear to year,dining $$ doesn’t.
I always wondered why the student government hasn’t persued having deals with off campus retailers to use the Carolina Card…this is so common at other universities.</p>
<p>Thanks that helps allot!</p>
<p>i’m a senior and my parents still put an average of $400 on it. This covers me for parking garage fees when at the library, snacks from vending machines at the library, meals when i’m on campus, random items at the book store etc. i think i may have had that much as a freshman in addition to my meal plan for overages (which will happen because you rarely fit a meal inside the specified amount) and extra on-campus spending–like starbucks! mmmmmm</p>
<p>Does your credit card company consider adding money to a Carolina Card a cash advance?</p>
<p>Or is it just a charge to USC?</p>
<p>fendrock
just a charge to USC,not a cash advance</p>
<p>Fendrock,
If you have a debit card on your checking account,(such as a Visa debit card) you can use that number to deposit money to a student’s Carolina Card account via VIP. It just asks you how much you want to deposit in $10 increments, and then you put in the debit card #, just as if you would some type of online purchase. It is just like any other debit card transaction.
My son goes through about the same amount of $ as USCTexan (Textbooks would be in addition to that.)</p>
<p>Hey Guys, Quick question…if D has money remaining on her Carolina Card from this past semester will it carry over to the coming semester?? (Spring 2010?)</p>
<p>yes the $$ will carry over until they graduate (Carolina Cash)…not Dining Dollars they expire every year</p>
<p>THX Cathymee! Have a great Holiday!</p>