Halifax credit card - To close or not to close?

cjmurray

Hello all,

Just wanting a little advice on what to do with my Halifax card. In a week or so, the balance will be down to £0. The limit is £3300.

My other debts are:
Citicard - £1500 5.0% LOB
Virgin - £2100 0% Jan 2010
Barclays - £2170 0% Feb 2010
Abbey - £0 0% Aug 2010

When Abbey (sorry .. Santander) sort themselves out and finally send my internet banking details, I'll be doing a BT and closing the Citi card. For the 0% cards due to end in Jan, Feb and Aug of next year, I have a plan in place to fund the closure of each and not incur any interest.

Hopefully with a little assistance from the parents, I'll be in a position to buy a property in Spring/Summer 2010, and at that time I'll be looking for 0% purchase deals on credit cards. £3300 of 0% purchases would be handy, so I'm trying to weigh up my options to see if I could snag something like that from the Halifax.

So far, I think my three options are:
a) Call up and close the account now, rejecting any offers. Wait 12 months and apply again. No idea what kind of limit I'd be offered though given the state of the economy.
b) Keep the card active with some regular spends, paying off in full each month. Then, request closure around the time I need the 0% deal. With any luck I could play the "loyal customer" card and get an offer. However, there's a risk of them just saying "ok, bye!" at my threat to leave, and then I'd have gained nothing between now and then. Plus I'd then have to wait a further 12 months to apply again.
c) Request closure now, perhaps get offered 0% on purchases for a few months, and just be happy that I've saved a small amount of money in that period.

Any thoughts?

Many thanks,
Chris

CannyJock

Not heard of a successful repeat deal on Halifax card for long time now. I cancelled mine couple of months ago, will reapply at some point in the future. The CS person said 3 months before I could apply for new offers on the card I had.

cjmurray

Thanks, CannyJock. I called up this morning and closed the account. There was a mention of a 0% BT offer, but not of 0% on purchases. Decided not to inquire, and just closed the account. I'll apply again nearer the time I need to make my purchases, and just cross my fingers! Cheers.