Can you do a balance transfer FROM the same card twice?!

diamond

Hello all,

Ok this is going to be very confusing, maybe a but long too. I prob should post this on the debt free board also.

Anyway I think the credit card experts on this board may be able to help.

I have 2 credit cards:

- Lloyds TSB Platinum - £6328 at 16.9%APR - Limit £7k
- Monument aka Providian - 1683 at 29.9% - Limit £4k

I have tried to get balance transfers to other companies but keep being refused, I have no idea why. Lloyds TSB Platinum have offered to let me increase my limit to £8.5k and a life of balance transfer for 7.9% plus a 2% transfer fee. So can anyone let me know if my following plan will work:

If I transfer £2317 from the Lloyds TSB to the Monument card and max it out to £4k. Then transfer the rest of the Lloyds TSB balance of £4011 to a temporary overdraft. (I know the bank will give me up to a £7k overdraft) This will leave the Lloyds card with a 0 balance.

Then transfer the £4k from the Monument card to the Lloyds card for the 7.9% offer.

Monument provide cheques so I then plan to pay off the overdraft with a monument cheque. (yawn I am boring myself)

Would Lloyds TSB then take a balance transfer from the Monument card again for the £4k that I have put back onto the Monument card?

This will then give me a debt of £8k with Lloyds at 7.9% for the life of balance.

I know this seems like a really long winded way but it's the only way I can think of to reduce the interest rate on the whole balance. I will be going on Maternity leave in about a week so desperately need to reduce my outgoing payments for the next 6 months as I will be get sweet nothing! Well I'll get £106 p/wk but that is pittance! My partner has left me so it's literally my income that will be paying for everything.

So my main question is will they take a balance transfer from the same card twice? Secondly does anyone have any better ideas?!

Thanks in advance for you help

Natasha

cornerclose

The plan looks ok to me with a couple of provisos. Check that your Monument card will allow you to fill it up to the full credit limit. Many cards won't as they want you to have a margin for fees/interest without going over the limit. It varies from card to card.
The other thing is that if you use a credit card cheque to pay off your overdraft you must be ready to shift the balance to the Lloyds card immediately. Most if not all cards charge interest on cheque transactions from day 1, NOT from the next statement date and at 29.9% on 4k it would soon mount up.

There should be no problem transferring twice from the same card - I have used repeated balance transfers to pay off my monthly spending on one of my cards.

magentadreamer

diamond wrote:

If I transfer £2317 from the Lloyds TSB to the Monument card and max it out to £4k. Then transfer the rest of the Lloyds TSB balance of £4011 to a temporary overdraft. (I know the bank will give me up to a £7k overdraft) This will leave the Lloyds card with a 0 balance.

I don't think you can do SBT's -transfer money into bank accounts with Lloyds so you wouldn't be able to transfer the remaining £4011 to your current account then onto your monuement card then back to Lloyds that way.

cornerclose

You wouldn't be transferring money into the bank account, you would be paying a debt off a credit card, which should be fine if the bank have sanctioned the overdraft.

grumbler

magentadreamer wrote:

I don't think you can do SBT's -transfer money into bank accounts with Lloyds so you wouldn't be able to transfer the remaining £4011 to your current account then onto your monuement card then back to Lloyds that way.

It is not a SBT, but quite opposit: transferring balance to overdraft, i.e. using an overdraft to pay a CC. This is very simple.

dc

Natasha, good luck,

Should work, but timing is an important factor. The transfer to the current account is negative magenta, so not a SBT just a cheque/transfer to pay off the Lloyds CC.

BTs can take a fortnight or so to complete, and as cornerclose says The Monument interest will be £100 a month on the £4k.

How will you know when the transfer has arrived at Monument?

magentadreamer

I stand corrected I read the transfer as a BT not that the poster would be writing out a cheque to pay off the CC's

YorkshireBoy

Depending on the fee (if any?) for the monument cheque, and of course the length of time the balance sits there at 29.9% APR, it might be cheaper to ask Monument to raise your limit to £8K. You could then move across the entire LTSB debt, then bring it straight back again to LTSB. Even if they won't give you the full £8K*, every little helps.

This would be particularly useful if LTSB won't let you do a second BT. Have you asked them?

I'm aware that LTSB allow multiple BT's within the first 6 weeks as part of their 0% introductory offer on the Platinum, but you'd need to check the specific T&C's of your LTSB LOB offer to see if they apply similar conditions to that.

* Edited to say: Get the LTSB limit increase under your belt first, and then ask Monument to raise your limit before the new LTSB credit limit has had chance to be reported to the CRA's. That way, although Monument will see the LTSB search (if one is made), they won't see the additional 'available' credit on your file.

diamond

YorkshireBoy wrote:

Depending on the fee (if any?) for the monument cheque, and of course the length of time the balance sits there at 29.9% APR, it might be cheaper to ask Monument to raise your limit to £8K. You could then move across the entire LTSB debt, then bring it straight back again to LTSB. Even if they won't give you the full £8K*, every little helps.

* Edited to say: Get the LTSB limit increase under your belt first, and then ask Monument to raise your limit before the new LTSB credit limit has had chance to be reported to the CRA's. That way, although Monument will see the LTSB search (if one is made), they won't see the additional 'available' credit on your file.

Thanks a lot everyone. I wasn't expecting anyone to even understand what on earth I was talking about much less such speedy replies - I'm really grateful.

I love the idea of asking Monument to increase my limit. I will try tomorrow.

DC/Cornerclose - I know exactly what you mean about timing, this can be a bit of a nightmare as I have discovered in the past. Also I am aware that Monument put extortionate fees on BT's. I need to double check with LTSB how long the offer stands because that could throw a spanner in the works too.

Thanks again for the advice I'll let you know how I get on.

Natasha

cymro1170

Me too.............