Finally done the sums

silverbirch_3

I've known for several months that i was getting into debt but today i have finally done the sums to work out by how much. I've added up all the credit card and overdraft debt and taken off my savings (stooze pot gone wrong) and I'm left with a debt of £5438.43. My husband knows nothing about this as he leaves all the finances to me.

The 0% on the credit cards finishes on 1st November but as total credit available from cards that i don't owe on is over £28000 i don't think i will be able to get another 0% card to shift the shortfall too.

I also have a car loan with finishes february 2006 and a mortgage. My husband is the only wage earner. I think i can pay off the debt without him knowing but I don't want to be paying interest on it as i'm only paying the minimum payment on each card.

Help!!

Tondella

Hi Silverbirch

Two things for you to do

1) identify money over and above the minimum repayment amount to get the debt paid off. If you draw up a budget (see other posts in this section for examples) then Money savers will help you identify places where you can pay less for the same product (e.g. with energy providers, mobile phone)

2) If I understand you correctly you have existing credit cards with no debt on them. You should be able to negotiate a reasonable existing customer deal with one of them, if not then maybe you should consider cancelling them to reduce the amount of credit available to you and then apply for a new customer 0% offer. Martin has tabulated existing customer offers from the major credit card providers here

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cgi-bin/viewnews.cgi?newsid1102103277,92385,

Good luck and keep posting!

System

silverbirch wrote:

The 0% on the credit cards finishes on 1st November but as total credit available from cards that i don't owe on is over £28000 i don't think i will be able to get another 0% card to shift the shortfall too.

As Tondella says, try to get an existing customer deal. Just phoning them and saying you're thinking of closing the a/c because the rate's too high and you've got X% on another card can work. I played that trick several times in my old "tarting" days.

If they won't play ball, then either end the agreements and close those a/c's, or at the very least phone them up and tell them you want to reduce your credit limit to a figure of your own choosing.

If you can reduce a £5k Cr limit to £500 - on a card you're not using - then you've knocked off a fair bit of "available credit" showing on your Credit File. Note - Gold and Platinum Cards may have a "lower ceiling" credit limit.

Tondella

Silverbirch

Here's a copy of a letter that I wrote to my credit card provider that resulted in my being offered and existing customer BT offer, after they had told me over the telephone that I could only get 15.9% BT rate as an existing customer. Scoundrels!

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?p=777690#post777690

Best wishes