Morgan Stanley card

The_Boss

Morgan Stanley are driving me mad, stopping my card every week it seems. Anyway, the only reason I'm staying with them is because of the cashback offer. Not because 0.5% means anything to me, but because they owe me about £35 from it. My anniversary is not until June.

Anyway, if I cancelled, would that mean I wouldnt get my cashback? I suspect no. My main question is that since I have had the card from 2001, will this affect my credit rating if I cancel too? Because I have over 4 years of history of repaying everything on time and dont want to lose this.

Careful_ly

Yes you will loose your cash back if you cancel before your anniversary.
If your credit rating is okay, you could apply for another card eg egg money 1% cashback, 2% for approx a month starting 16th November, and not use the morgan stanley and cancel after youve had cashback

The_Boss

Thing is, I'm trying to increase my credit rating and I'm not sure that if I cancel the Morgan one and get accepted by Egg that the rating would be the same

grumbler

The_Boss wrote:

Thing is, I'm trying to increase my credit rating and I'm not sure that if I cancel the Morgan one and get accepted by Egg that the rating would be the same

In this case you can ask them to reduce your credit limit to the smallest available ...

The_Boss

Tis true. Maybe reduce it to a fiver [:D] - would that increase my rating then?

grumbler

The_Boss wrote:

would that increase my rating then?

Yes, but only if your total available credit (excluding mortgage) is comparable with your annual income. If available credit is much less than income, reducing a limit will not have visible effect.

The_Boss

Hmm. Interesting. So I'm assuming that when I tell the card company how much I earn and they could possibly look at my Experian score in a better light. I know that its not from that they make the final decision, but I've got such a chip on my shoulder because Experian put me as poor when I've never missed a payment and paid back thousands in full for a few years

grumbler

The_Boss wrote:

... they could possibly look at my Experian score in a better light....

They don't look at your Experian score. They look only at your file and have their own scoring system.

Your Credit Rating: How they decide and how you find out for free Martin's article ...

The_Boss

Yeah, I've read that article several times before to try and help me improve my rating because the Experian one is the only one I can see!! I'm placing too much importance on it.

For the record, since you know so much, do you have any ideas about this?
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=107058

grumbler

The_Boss wrote:

...since you know so much, do you have any ideas about this?

... Not much enough . I never checked my score. The only thing I do is checking my £2 files 1-2 times a year.

The_Boss

Well thanks for your usefull information anyway. Bloody Experian have made me think I'm going to be rejected by most companies!