Credit Card Balance Transfer Discussion Area 2

Unbelievable_2

Re MBNA BTs - for info.

I rang MBNA late last night, got straight through to a very nice lady. She checked my account details and said that it states ' transfer fee waived for introductory period' (I have a Virgin card, 0% for 9 months). She didn't know how the on-line transfer worked and whether the same criteria applied but 'guaranteed' that if I BTd by phone I would not be charged

dbamforth

Quick question - I've transferred a balance from my 0% Egg card to a new Halifax 0% card after using Egg's 6 month interest free period.

Should I now cancel/close my Egg card ? Will it help me keep a good credit score or does it make no difference if I simply keep the card but don't use it.

Also, if I close the card, presumably I can reapply to Egg in the future if they do a good credit card offer or will there be a problem if I've had a credit card with them previously.

Thanks
Darren

Suzz_2

It is well worth holding on to your egg card for a number of reasons:

1  Their 'Anniversay Offer' - every year you'll get 5 months interent free BTs.
2  It's a good card for shuffling money round as you can BT direct into your current account, online for free
3  I don't think their rates are too bad - not that you want to be paying any interest...

Most cards, I would say cancel, but keep the egg.
You'll find loads more about Egg benefit on this forum.

lyeping

Me and hubby(with some arm twisting from myself) is planning to apply for 1 each, preferably 2 credit cards that do SBT to raise enough money to pay off our AA loan of GBP11,000. This I calculated will help save about GBP1,000 in interest over 3 years. My question:-

1) Can I apply for 2 different card simultanously? I've read about credit scoring, so if I do so, will it do any difference to my credit scoring?

2) If it's best to do it one at the time, which will be the easiest? MBNA (2.9%) or Egg(not sure on their lifetime balance rate but 0% is better than nothing) or Texaco (3.9%)? Any suggestions?

3) Anybody knows of any credit cards offering low interest on lifetime balance other than Barclay? Me and hubby each already's got a barclay card and we manage to get them to do an SBT! . Must be able to do the SBT coz the loan is in husband's name. Need lifetime transfer deals coz we intend to spread this GBP11,000 over 3 years.


To my knowledge, the only thing we've done lately that might get flagged in any credit checking is hubby got increased in his credit card limit plus we've actually appplied for the alliance and leceister current account, just to get the GBP25 incentive! And we've done a couple of BT last week. Does this comes up in one's credit check?

Thanks in advance. You've all have been teaching me alot over this past few weeks. In turn, I then 'enlightened' the stubborn hubby into the many ways on saving money!

Ziggy_3

Hi lyeping

I have no knowledge of cc back office processes but do have 3 years of experience doing BTs and usually have about 6 cards on the go at the same time.

1) Approx. every 6 months I spend an afternoon firing off applications simultaneously. Only once have I been refused a card. In this case I was inadvertently applying for 2 NMBA cards at the same time (under different issuer names).

2) Most of the cards I’ve had have been applied for on-line. They usually take 3-5 minutes to complete. Some give instant application feedback. Follow any of the links recommended on this site. However, the key time consideration isn’t the application, but the effort required to maintain payment. Upon receiving the first bill, I set up a monthly minimum payment and a final loan repayment (actually I pay the minimum plus £10 so that I don’t trip any credit scoring routines that weed out customers who can only pay the minimum). That’s it, apart from the call to customer services to cancel the account in a few months time. I of course wish to maintain the borrowing, so if I time a new application right, I cancel the final payment with my bank and perform another BT instead.

3) I’d recommend not getting a life-time low deal, but instead transfer onto a new 0% offer (assuming banks still find this offer a usful marketing tool).

Why stop at £11,000? I’ve currently go about £65,000 free money that I use to offset my mortgage, saving me about £3000 / year?

-

I’ve had just about every deal I can find. Has anyone been around the block and is now re-applying for the same cards they’ve previously held? If so, do you have any success?

Callyanna

??? just wondering if anyone has managed to do a bt with MBNA Platinum Plus during the 0% intro period without being charged 2% fee in the last few days? either online or on the phone?
Am i right in thinking that bts with a Virgin cc are still "free" at the moment, despite being an associate card?

jacinta_2

hi all.im pretty new to the credit card shuffle so hopefully someone can tell me if im going in the right direction.i would consider myself excellent with repayments and have an excellent credit score.until now i have just done the usual "throw any spare cash in the savings account"but from reading the posts on here i have just opened a cahoot savings acc and also been accepted for an egg cc with a 5k limit.would i be right in saying that my next step should be to sbt the 5k into the cahoot savings then transfer the debt around as the 0% runs out.any help would be much welcomed.

lyeping

Thanks Ziggy Will be firing off the application online shortly afterwards. Who knows what I'll net?? The associate group of cards you mentioned, I believe they are MBNA, Abbey and Virgin. These are the names I've managed to gathered so far, from other posters. Sometimes I find it rather confusing trying to read the 'conversations' because too many abbreviation and jargons .

I'm still aiming for Texaco @3.9% simply because I'm not very confident about my credit score enough to net another card to BT to 6 months later. But I'll definetely go 'shopping' every 6 months as you suggested. Will apply either MBNA and egg too, the experiment here is applying simultanously for 3 cards and see what comes back.

DanMan_3

Ziggy! How did you manage to get £65k Were all the cards ones which offered SBT's?

Reaper

would i be right in saying that my next step should be to sbt the 5k into the cahoot savings then transfer the debt around as the 0% runs out.any help would be much welcomed.

Correct. Although to be extra cautious I would SBT into your bank account and from there to Cahoot so it isn't too obvious you are using it for savings. You don't want them to treat it as a cash advance.

Also if you are a tax payer and haven't already got a cash ISA put the first £3000 in one of them, and the rest in Cahoot.