Egg - scandalous interest rate increase

vet8

lisyloo wrote: »

I don't believe they held a gun to anyone's head.
You knowingly entered into variable rate lending.
You could have saved up before you bought stuff.
I always save up before I buy stuff which sometimes means waiting.
I've never had these type of problems because I don't enter into these kind of agreements that expose me to this kind of risk.
You knowing got into it and exposed yourself to this risk.
Stop blaming the rest of the world.
Get a Saturday/Sunday/evening job(s) to pay it off - clean, deliver papers if necessary and save up front for things you want.

While everything you say is correct it is not at all helpful to people who are in trouble and post on here for help. Some posters here seem to think that everyone who owes money has p***ed it up the wall on booze and fast living. The unfortunate truth is that often life comes and bites you on the bum when you least expect it and you need to get money from ANYWHERE just to survive and that gets you into debt. Illness, redundancy, even simple things like your car, which you need to get to work, needing an expensive repair.

My OH lost his job several years ago and despite desperate efforts trying to find a new job he was unemployed for 6 months. His income fell from about £2,000 per month to about £200, but we still had the mortgage etc. to pay for, so we had to use CCs for things we would not usually do. That takes a while to pay back and it is not helped by the CC companies raising their rates to ridiculous levels.

bengal-stripe

jon-jo wrote: »

Regarding your CC, I'd switch it to a 0% card asap.

This is the standard advice given here: shift your debts to a zero % card.

You seem to have forgotten, that these cards are pretty difficult to come-by these days: there is a credit crunch on, you know. Particular if someone like the OP has his/her card maxed out to the full. The companies want solvent customers who stay with the card in the long term, long after that promotional offer has expired. CC are not different to anyone else: everybody wants a permanent relationship, not a kind of “wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am (or Sam)” encounter

Even if the OP could get hold of one of those cards, giving that huge limit of 15k the OP need, in nine or twelve months down the road, s/he could be in the very same position again, having made no inroads into the debt.

wroughtironron

lisyloo wrote: »

I don't believe they held a gun to anyone's head.
You knowingly entered into variable rate lending.
You could have saved up before you bought stuff.
I always save up before I buy stuff which sometimes means waiting.
I've never had these type of problems because I don't enter into these kind of agreements that expose me to this kind of risk.
You knowing got into it and exposed yourself to this risk.
Stop blaming the rest of the world.
Get a Saturday/Sunday/evening job(s) to pay it off - clean, deliver papers if necessary and save up front for things you want.

Quenn of Smugness

Martinslovechild

bengal-stripe wrote: »

You seem to have forgotten that these cards are pretty difficult to come by these days: there is a credit crunch on, you know. Particular if someone like the OP has his/her card maxed out to the full. The companies want solvent customers who stay with the card in the long term, long after that promotional offer has expired. CC are not different to anyone else: everybody wants a permanent relationship, not a kind of “wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am (or Sam)” encounter.

This is an interesting comment.

Prior to the credit crunch, I had available credit totalling approximately 2.5x my gross salary which was spread across a number of credit cards, all of which were at 0% APR. I maxed-out most of this limit to allow me to stooze against my mortgage, thereby allowing me to redeem my mortgage much earlier than otherwise would have been the case. I am the complete opposite of 'loyal', or as bengal-stripe puts it, a “wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am (or Sam)” person.

Roll forward a couple of years and bizarrely I have more credit available to me now than I did back then!. Two credit card companies for which I have existing cards (unused for the past 12 months or more) have written to me within the last month alone - the first has offered 0% for 12 months with a 3% fee (on a credit limit > £20K !!) and the second has offered 0% for 12 months with a 0% fee.

Maybe this puts a different stance on things. It's fair to say that I've never missed a payment but it's fairly obvious from my credit report that I'm certainly not loyal. It's likely that credit card companies choose their customers carefully but don't assume that it's impossible to get credit in this 'new age' of finance.

BTW - if the original poster has other credit cards which are stuck in a drawer, it's worth phoning the company up to see whether they have any promotional BT rates available. This has worked for me many times over the years - it's surprising how a simple question can lead to a surprising result. Good luck.

almost_there

wow we have Egg at 29% my Vanquis is at 34% not a big difference really between mainstream and sub-prime!

YorkshireBoy

Martinslovechild wrote: »

This is an interesting comment.

Remember though, that with the new CRA reporting format, lenders can now clearly identify loyalty (or, more accurately, disloyalty) by the 'promotional rate' indicator(s) on your report(s).

I'm sure that, over time and as more and more lenders report the new 'white data', we'll see a shift in lending practices.

jadex

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

Exceeding your limit is viewed far more seriously than paying late/not at all one month.

According to the letter I've got from one CC company:
"I confirm that we automatically send a report to Experian and Equifax every month about your account. We do not mark accounts as over limit, but we do record when payments haven't been made. We explain the accounts exactly as they are on the day that the report is sent, this includes the current balance section. On your credit file, this shows next to the credit limit section."

So, if CC balance is put back below the limit on the day they send data to CRAs, it is not shown on your credit file.
But late payment is, unfortunately.

frugallass

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

Doesn't the communication offer that alternative? It should do (by Law now?)

thanks, yes it does - I've sent the request to cancel the card and pay off the balance at the current rates

lisyloo

However, I thought this was an advice and help site for people to do with money and therefore problems and concerns. Your hollier than thou attitude on it doesn't tend to make for great discussion.

I accept some of your points and I'm glad to see you are accepting some of the responsibility.
I think you've had plenty of good advice on here, so the site is helping you a lot.
However I really don't think you can make the statements you've made (which are quite inflammatory) without expecting people to make counter arguments to it. You've practically invited it.

I do happen to be of the opinion that professionals hold more responsibility than lay people i.e. if I employed a mechanic I'd expect him/her to know more about car engines than me and therefore I do believe that financial institutions should accept at least equal blame.
However we don't live in a totally ideal/fair world where people's well being is looked out for by companies.
We live in a capitalist world where businesses are simply out to make money and people have to take account of that in their dealings.
If you think about an estate agent or car dealer, you would not expect them to "look out" for you, so why would you expect a financial institution to "look out" for your interests??

and I disgree it doesn't make for good debate........I think we're having one

If you didn't want to debate the issues then why start it by "ranting" (sorry can't think of a better word).
If you jsut wanted help, then just ask for help.
People will of course react if you make statements like you did.

Sonalita

Wow so many messages since I posted yesterday.

I got a "sorry there's nothing we can do" message back from Egg but today I applied online for a couple of cards and got accepted for both the capital one card and the new MBNA low interest deal. MBNA gave me an instant yes with a good credit limit. Capital one said yes but didnt specify the limit - so hopefully between the two of them I can clear my egg balance and eliminate the very high egg rate. I have some endowment policies maturing in a couple of years and a number of shares coming up that I can sell tax free that my employer gives us each year so hopefully I can be debt free in 2 or 3 years.

To the person who said "get a life, its's your fault, save for what you need" - I was somewhat disappointed to see that attitude in a community that I thought was based around helping each other. There are valid reasons as to why I've managed to build up such a big debt, one of which was the totally unexpected arrival of twins. There's been many other factors that meant we had to spend on the card in emergency situations. My wife is unable to work due to a combination of long term ill health and raising children, and we have no extended family around to support us. for that reason I was unable to work more hours than I was already doing - but now the kids are older and we're taking steps to pay off our debts.

So yeah, thanks for the "holier than thou" attitude it's really not helpful.

For all the other people who DID post useful suggestions, thankyou.

Yes, I can suspend the card and pay off at the old interest rate but with the new cards, I'd rather not do that.