0% transfer or not? Please help.

rkh001

I have had my Halifax One Visa statement yesterday - balance of about £1850. This is on LOB rate of 6.9%. They have also included a form if I wish to transfer another credit card to this account at 0% for 9 months. I have about £3,000 limit that I can use.

I have M&S card with balance of about £1100. This would be good to transfer as it is at 15.9% at present. But is it not true that if I transfer to %, anything I pay goes to the % balance and the rest carries on accruing interest?

Will it still be good to transfer or should I leave things be? Will snowballing with all the rates help and how should I deal with 2 different rates on same card?

Thanks.

lynzpower

No, you should definately transfer!!!

Basicallly snowballing works by hitting your highest interest debt. So, I have an egg card with 2k on which the minimum payment is being paid. However I have a bcard at 20% with only now about200 left on it. Ive been doing all I can to throw most income at the debt thats costing me money, ie the one with interest.

If you transfer your M&S of 1100 to 0% all this debt will be at 0% until you reach the end of the period ( ie 9 months or whatever your deAL IS) Also somewhere on this site theres avery handy service from martin - you type in your mobile no & when your 0% deal is up, and MSE will automatically send you text to remind you to have a dig around and find another 0% deal so that whne this one expires, you dont get stuffed for interest again

Hope that made sense. BAsically the bottom line, the less interest you pay the better

rkh001

Thanks Lynz.

So, it would be good to transfer and throw as much at it as possible and try and reduce it as quickly as possible. Makes sense to me but I sometimes get confused by the way banks work.

Thanks again.

Imelda

hi rkh001,

Bascially, although it appears to be working against the rule of snowball it will be cheaper (you'll only be paying the equivalent of about 4% interest for the next 9 months) as long as you pay off the £1100 within the promotional rate. How much can you throw at this debt per month?

CLAPTON

i would be a little cautious.

presumably your LOB continues as normal if you use the 0% BT?

what happens at the end of the 0% period ...will you have paid off the 0% money by then (I'm assuming that all your repayments will go towards paying off the 0% balance rather than the LOB ), if not what will the APR be then?

can you get a seperate 0% card and keep the two balances apart.

rkh001

Clapton, I will be speaking to Halifax before I do anything because I too am concerned about what happens after the 0% ends. Hopefully, I will be able to pay that off before the promotion ends as OH owes me £300 for emergency repairs on his car. I am able to throw £100/month at the debt.

Will let you all know after I have spoken to them.

rkh001

UPDATE: Just spoke to Halifax. It transpires that the comments on my statement about 0% related to when I opened the account and nothing to do with what I can do now. Really p***ed off about that - with myself thinking that they meant I can transfer now.
Anyway, they have offered me LOB transfer at the same rate already there (6.59%)for anything else. So, I now have a different dilemma...

Do I transfer £1100 from M&S (15.9%) to Halifax card or do I take about £2800 (balance I can transfer) from my Virgin card (at 11.9% on £10400 :eek)? Or do I do all of M&S and the balance of Virgin (if Halifax allow 2 transfers)?

Which option do you think would be best for me?

Thanks.

CLAPTON

if you can do two transfers then do the M&S for 1100 and then the balance from the Virgin

if you can do only one transfer then it will be more beneficial to transfer 2,800 at 11.9% than 1,100 at 15.9%

rkh001

Just spoke to Virgin to check what the minimum payment is on the balance in terms of percentages. They told me that each month I have to pay the interest plus £5. What???!!!!!??? I am shocked! Exactly when does the capital ever get paid off?

Based on that information, I will be moving £2800 of Virgin to Halifax Visa at 6.95% and keeping the M&S as I can pay that off quite quickly (if I try hard enough!).

I really need to get my act together rather than keep falling off the wagon on a regualr basis. Need a big shiny boot (hope SS is reading this) up my wotsit!! Any offers of this unique job gratefully accepted :-)

tawnyowls

Virgin are actually quite sneaky on loans, and they have swingeing charges for late payments, bounced cheques and the like.

CLAPTON

many of the MBNA family of credit cards (of which Virgin is one) have a minimum monthly payment of interest plus £5 so you will virtually never repay the loan.
however, one can of course pay more than the minimum.