Help with working something out

d_cross

Hi,

I'm pig sick of Barclays at the minute and having a few niggles at the minute, so it's got me thinking and doing a bit of research.

- To start I've got the Barlcays additions account (yes I know I haven't used the extras!) so I pay £14/mth admin charge and because I use the £2200 overdraft I pay an additional £12 in interest (~£26/mth total).
- I've got a Barclaycard which has about £1900 (@22%), which once my wife has polished hers off she will start to attack mine, but this won't be for another 6months. I'm paying about £50/mth off until then.
- I've also got a barclay loan with £4100 left at 7.1%, paying about £200/mth and has about 22-24 months left (can't exactly remember when it started)

You may say that I've been a "loyal" customer to Barclays man and boy but recently I'm starting to think! I can afford to service the loan and the credit card but it won't solve the o'draft which I will still be getting charged on.

Basically I want to kick Barclays in to touch as I'm thoroughly fed up with them and sort my accounts out. My income is £2100/mth and my DD's are about £1650 so there should be plenty left.

My thought's are, which I would like to take advice on, are to either go for a flexible loan from Post Office (9.9%) or get a Zopa (7.4%) loan for the full amount to cover the Loan/Card/O'draft and pay them all off. The monthly calculators on the sites say this should cost between £230-250/month over 36 months and to take out a First Direct (or equivalent) fee free current account. This way I can service the loan within my standard monthly outgoings on the loan/account charges but I will be paying the whole lot off. The benefit of going Post Office is if/when my wife finishes her credit cards we can over pay and reduce the term on the loan.:T

Any thoughts?

cheers,
D

GeorgeUK

For most loans there are early settlement charges. Have you looked at how much this may be? Should be in the T&C.

Have you though about getting 0% creditcards to transfer the overdraft or CC debt to? Virgin has a good deal on right now - 0% for 16 months and minimum payment from 2nd month is £25.

If you do decide to go for a loan ask if the rate advertised is the rate you will get, or if it is the "typical" rate.

d_cross

I'd love to go down the credit cards route, but I've not been that organised in the past to manage the switching.

One other question we've thought about is if I do this and swap the debts into one place will this affect my credit rating or not?

Ta

RAS

It is the value of your debts not the number.

Consolidation is not generally a good idea.

if you do it you need to make sure you can overpay and not face a penalty.

if you clear the barclaycard you may get a 6.9% deal.