Best way to reduce Credit card bills...

2Yeartarget

Hi all.

Need a little advice here from someone a little bit more savvy.

I owe roughly 7500, split as follows:

Virgin- £6455 - limit = £11,000, APR 15.9%
Lloyds TSB - £900 - limit £1500, APR 15.9%

I also have a credit of £37.50 on Barclaycard.

I wanted to move all the debt to a 0% balance transfer card, but obviously my current credit worthiness can't be great, best deal I could get was Capital one 0% f0r 6 months, with a whacking 24.9% if I use the card (which I won't)...plan was to keep it there, then cancel the Lloyds and one of Virgin/Barclaycard and either get a new 0% card at that time when hopefully my credit would be better, or if not move the debt to the remaining card at the best terms possible.

As it happens, Capital One have only given me a 2k limit (despite telling me they'd give me higher), so I've just created a bigger problem.

My current thinking is to return the Capital One card, cancel the agreement...and work with the card I have...but I'm not sure how best to proceed.

I can't apply for a new card...wouldn't dare, and although Barclaycardl and Virgin have cracking balance transfer deals, they're new customer only.

Any ideas (other than"don't spend money on credit cards if you can't repay it immediately!)??

Thank you.

tictax

How mch can you relistically pay off each month?

Multiply this amount by 5months and transfer this amount to the capital one account to start with.

Another option could be to apply for a lifetime balance card (not sure which ones are around these days) and transfer the balance to one of them. Any interest at less than 15.9% is an improvement.

2Yeartarget

Another card is a no-no I think, don't believe I'd get the credit anyway.

I'm budgeting on paying £150- £170 per month, which I want to eat into the debt, not just repay interest. But even if I move 2k onto Capital one and pay, say £90 pcm on that, I'll need to pay more than £60-£80 pcm to stay on top of Virgin & LLoyds.

Paul_Herring

I'm budgeting on paying £150- £170 per month

Virgin minimum repayment (3%?) works out at £194 - are the numbers you're giving over and above the minimum repayments?

2Yeartarget

No that's what I can realistically afford to pay. (Minimum Virgin repayment this month is £174). My aim has got to be to get what I can off that card, reduce the monthly payment (most of which will just go on interest anyway) and get it on to a card whereby what I pay reduces debt.

Just not sure how to do it though.