Why is my credit rating bad (credit info shown). Advice please

Hi all

I have been hoping to cosolidate my debts for a while now onto one credit card, with no/lower interest but my credit rating is holding me back.

I had a blip in my rating the second half of last year - I graduated from university, red brick, in an engineering degree summer 2015, then I was looking for work and did not secure a job until end of December 2015. So for 6 months I was on jobseekers allowance and so unable to keep up with my credit card repayments. I rang 2 of my credit cards every month - Barclaycard and Bank of Scotland, to tell them I was still looking for work. It was an agreement that I ring every month to let them know my situation and during this they made sure no interest was added on. Obviously the minimum monthly repayments kept adding up though.

When it came to about January this year Barclaycard were not far off defaulting me I think (I think as it had been 6 months of no payments), and Bank of Scotland did default me. I rang them up to tell them my situation and that I had now found work, earning £23,000/year. The woman understood my situation that I was only in finacial trouble as I had finished uni and was looking for work. She said she would remove the default and then suggested putting me on a thing where I pay £50/month and there is no interest. She said I will get no monthly statements, just a letter every year I think saying what I owe. She said I was actually better off doing this now, rather than going back to paying the credit card like I used to as there was no interest with this, so I thought great. She assured me the default had been removed and this new thing would not affect my credit rating.

Obviously at this point in January my credit rating wasn't good after about 6 months of no payments on 2 credit cards. I paid to Barclaycard what I owed them in repayments in the previous 6 months in one go in January, and since January this year have been good with my payments for everything, except for one late payment in February on my Barclaycard credit card.

10 months into full time employment on £23,000 a year, £1500ish/month going into my TSB account, only 1 late payment, I didn't expect to still have a poor credit rating. I hoped after 6 months I'd be able to move my debts to one low interest card or even interest free (!).

I have attached screenshots of all the information from Equifax on my credit agreements. Could anyone shed light onto why my credit rating is still bad (505 on noddle and 294 on Equifax. I signed up to Experian earlier in the year for the free trial so can't see their rating now) ? I can only assume it is the non payments end of last year? But that was 10 months ago so I thought it would improve by now.

I'm not sure if what Bank of Scotland have put me on is affecting my rating? The grey squares say ''status - not updated'' when I hover over them. There's definitely nothing with default on my credit report, and I don't think they have me down as arrangement to pay...

I have tried to book an appointment with TSB (I have been with them 9 years and my wages go into TSB now) to see if they can help me consolidate it all (after telling them the reason why I had financial trouble) but they aren't interested in booking an appointment with me as the woman said I have no available credit. She said there must be something affecting my rating.

It's just annoying seeing the interest each month on my statements, when I feel I could pay it all off much more quickly and cheaply on a lower interest rate if I could get it, and I live at home, so on £23k I should be ok really financially.

Any ideas would be much appreciated :huh: Thanks for reading!!

Hayley

Edit:: can't seem to put link in of my credit report as I'm a new user :sad:

Try http /pho.to /ANFSW (taking out the 2 spaces)