Should I Stay or Should I Go..

stressedoutmum

What would you do? I took out an 18th month 0% interest with Capital One.I had 6 months at 0% for purchases but 18 months at O% for balance transfers. I also had to pay the 2% fee. My balance was about £2000 but is now about £2500. The normal interest rate is 14.9% . Next month is the first month I pay interest which is estimated at £11 as my 6 months on purchases is now up. I still have the O% on transfers until Jan 07. My question is would I be better off changing to another credit card to avoid interest payments as I understand that they take my payments off the O% balance first so I will be paying interest on my purchases until Jan 07. It will probably take me the best part of 2 years to pay the whole lot off. thanks.

Bokken_2

The short answer is YES.
You have highlighted all the points so you know what you are doing try to move allof it or part of the balance to another 0% card.You should aim to pay no interest on anything you buy or borrow including your car and mortgage.It isn't easy but it is possible.
Also consider seperating BT/purchase/borrowing so they are on different cards rather than having BT and purchases on the same card unless you are very accurate and fully understand the allocation of payments and interest this can lead to problems so it may be better to keep them apart.
just a idea
There is no need to cancel your Cap one card once you have cleared the balance to another card you can use it again just be aware of the uncapped BT fee.

researcher

My Capital One bt fee is capped at £50 - although 4 customer service staff said differently. However it was clearly stated in the original correspondence that came with the card - so check yours. If it is, it might be worth BT'ing everything to another card - (go for one with no transfer fee), and then later bt'ing it back to Capital to take advantage of the rest of the 0% time.