juggling options - could do with a kick in right direction

kragen_ironfist

ok heres the deal I have four credit cards at the moment

£1,544.88 on Capital One @ 3.5% APR for life (balance transfer) - credit limit £9,000
£1,525.44 on Barclaycard @ 0% APR until January 2007 (balance transfer) - credit limit £1,700
£1,214.78 on HSBC @ ??% APR (1.167% per month) - credit limit £5,500
£831.20 on Abbey @ ??% APR (1.160% per month) - credit limit £8,600

I also have a £1,200 overdraft

Now abbey have sent me a load of credit card chewues offering me 0% on the cheques and balance transfers until July 07.

My original idea was to transfer abbey balance to HSBC (£16 transfer fee) the transfer the sum of the 2 balances back to abbey to get the 0% interest detail (transfer fee approx £40) my biggest concern is that abbey would spot what I was doing and take away the offer. I was also wondering if I should use this offer to clear my overdraft at the same time

then I had another thought...
one of my work colleagues owes me £339.50 which I will get on pay day
in my loose change pots in my bedroom I have £325.18 (just counted it - took about an hour )
in my HSBC basic account I have £98.68
and in my abbey savings I have £37.85

so a total available of £801.21

do I use this to kill my abbey card and transfer HSBC balance @ 0%
or do I use it to lower my overdraft by 2/3 and shuffle the credit cards as I previously planned?

and if I choose the former, should I use a credit card cheque to clear my overdraft? at 0% interest for 6 months

mintymoneysaver

Purely for the pleasure of knowing you've cleared a card, I 'd get rid of Abbey.Swop the HSBC MONEY OVER and then CUT the HSBC card up!
then throw all your money at Barclaycard and capital one as these either finish 0% earliest or have the biggest interest rate.

lynzpower

Read very carefully what the cheques are designed for . they may be a cheque for a 0% card, but often they are astronomical in terms of interest and also can remove the 0% ness of the original card. Martin did an article on this some weeks ago and the issue was :eek:

CLAPTON

be careful and read and re read the t&Cs.
your ideas are good but you need to consider timing of the transactions and whether they work.

basically if you move 831.20 to clear the abbey card you wil probably have to wait for a new statement cycle before abbey consider the card clear.

so e.g. you probably can't just pay 831.20 in one day and use the 0% cheques for a few grand a few days later. abbey would probably see that as negative balance of 831.20 plus further negative cheques of 2000 then a payment of 831.20 which reduces the cheque balance and not the original amount.

i dont think abbey would notice or care about your original idea of paying off by BT to your HSBC...its not against their T&Cs is it?

all_hours

Could you transfer the higher interest cards onto the capital one to get 3.5% life of balance? Do you pay a transfer fee?

If not the £2000 transfers would cost you maximum £70 in interest over the year. Compare this to the immediate charge of £56 transfer fees for juggling around the 0% cards, but then you have to do another transfer and incur more fees before the full 12 months are up. It depends how much you're paying off each month.

What would the transfer fee be on the cheques. Don't some of these have a £50 fee.

Then use the £800 to bring down the OD. What's the APR on your OD?

spud30

I agree with mintymoneysaver, but don't just cut up the card.

Make sure you write and cancel it.

kragen_ironfist

thank you all for your responses - where do I start

@ Minty - yes I agree purely to clear one card is my main intention. then I want to throw as much at the Capital one card as poss (keep it at the £200/month I am paying now) at that rate, in january it will be down to about £175, this is the point at which both 0% deals would end so I may then be able to persuade capital one (or even HSBC if I keep the card but lock it away) to give me another deal on the balance of my remaining cards.

@ Lynz - the cheques are for a card I already have (have had for four years) and am paying interest at standard APR whatever that is prob about 15% or something stupid like that. this is what the letter that came with the cheques says

The interest rate on your account has been reduced to 0.0% per annum on all new cheque transactions and balance transfers made before the date of your January statement*, as long as you make a credit card cheque or balance transfer transaction by your august 2006 statement date.

*A handling fee of 2% (min £3, max £50) will be applied to all cheque transactions and may be applied to balance transfers, unless you have been notified of a recent change in terms. If we do charge you, you will see it on your statement. The monthly interest rate on credit card cheques and balance transfers is now 0.0000%, equivalent to 0.0% per annum until the date of your January 2007 staetment

@ Clapton - that was my biggest reason for posting - esp as I have to make the transfer by the date of my August statement (is that the one they send out in July?) maybe paing off the Abbey card with my cash and just transferring the £1200 from HSBC would be best scenario??

@ All_hours - It is possible that could transfer the Abbey and HSBC to capital one, but I dont think I would get them to give me the same rate as my previous BT, last time I asked them about this all they could offer me was 6% for 9 months on new BT - which is why I took out the Barclay card 0% for 10 months in March. what I'm hoping is come January when the Barlcay card and possibly Abbey offers run out and I only have £175 left on Capital One to pay they may reconsider. AS for transfer fee to Capital one - there wasn't last time but this may have changed. cheques question answered above.
As I credit over £1000 to my account each month I am only charged 2.5% APR interest on my OD (about £5) and that is currently set on the preffered in credit rate. if I was to change to the preffered overdraft rate the APR would be cut to 0.2% (16.9% if I credit less than £1000 per month) but it will cost me £10 to switch rate - is it worth it?

@ spud - I wont cut up the card - I need one I can use purely for work (i.e - boss asks me to buy stuff, I pay by card, and he write cheque out to credit card co paying it off immediately) also with HSBC I get 5 year extened warranty on any electrical goods I buy!

thankyou all again for your help - as far as I can see, my best course of action looks to be
clear the abbey card with the £800 I can scrape together from savings
transfer the HSBC to abbey for 0% until January 07 (handling fee approx £25)
let the overdraft ride for now (maybe pay the £10 charge to drop the interest from 2.5% to 0.2% as I always credit over £1000 a month
keep paying Capital one at £200 per month
only pay min payments on the 0% cards which end in January 07
in january see if I can get a deal on left over debts
at which point I should only owe approx £2,325 on my other cards and may have even reduced my OD by other means

anyone see anything wrong with that?

anyone know if i'll get penalised for taking half a ton of loose change into my bank

breakdown of the loose change I counted from my bedroom to wards the £800 pot of available cash...

£_72.00 in £2 coins
£113.00 in £1 coins
£_30.00 in 50p's
£_57.80 in 20p's
£_26.80 in 10p's
£_13.90 in 5p's
£__6.98 in 2p's
£__4.70 in 1p's
============
£325.18 total