Ex- Credit Analyst - Throw your Credit & Underwriting Q's at me.

littlestar1981

Do yopu know if you are declined for a credit card how long you should wait before applying for another with another company? I really need a BT

Snaggles

kafka wrote:

Mike,
Thanks for the answer on my other thread. I may be needing your help a bit to decide the right option for me.

Here's one for you. I got to see my credit file via a free trial at creditexpert. This was quite usefull to see my file. It has all the people I owe money to except my first direct bank account which shows up as a current account with £500 overdraft but I also have a personal loan with them which only has a couple of months to run but this does not show, what is the reason for this?

Thanks in advance

Hello!

Sharing positive data (accounts/limits/balances etc) is a relatively new thing in the banking world - historically banks would only share negative data (late payments/defaults etc). When companies first begin to share positive data, as I believe First Direct has recently done, they may only share data about certain types of accounts (for example a company might share data about credit cards, but not loans), which is why your overdraft might show but not your loan.

I suspect that eventually most (possibly all) banks etc may share positive data about all lending facilities, but as I understand it, the situation at the moment is that some banks are sharing positive data on all products, some are just sharing on some products, and some don't share positive data at all.

Snaggles

ccjbegone wrote:

First of all a big THANKS to you :-) You deserve about a 1000 pints for this free advice

Ok - I have full electoral roll going back 3 years - the ER at my current address is only for the last month though, and I moved in 10 months ago. The ER info at my last address takes me up to last month though - will that overlap be Ok?

Re: Virgins explanation, they said there was "no bad stuff but not enough good stuff" which I thought was a nice way to let me down gently . I'm going to call them back with the Electoral Roll information - let's see what they say.

The reason for the low debt-to-income ratio is that I currently pay discounted rent at my mates flat that that she is currently redecorating. If I was paying the normal rate i calculated it at 24% - is that still OK?

Hello!

I would class your debt-to-income ratio as how much you owe in relation to your annual salary - ie annual salary £20k, £1k credit card, £1k loan, debt-to-income ratio 10%. So this wouldn't be affected by how much rent you pay.

I think what you may be referring to is your commitment level - ie, level of monthly outgoings compared to level of monthly income. As a guideline I would say that if your outgoings are less than 60% of your monthly net salary, then you would be fine. (I would class outgoings as the things you HAVE to pay each month, such as mortgage/rent, council tax, childcare, child maintenance, loan and credit card payments, but I wouldn't include things like your gym membership, mobile phone bill etc).

Hope that helps!

piper5

ok have a challenge for you mike,
i had an excellant history with money until about 3 years ago i got a charge from abbey on my account due to a debenhams store card payment falling through. i managed the account but then lost the store card, but continued payments.. basically the minimum payment until last year when i paid it all off in full and closed the account. this though didnt help my history with abbey and i had got into a really vicious circle of charges. every month i could expect to pay atleast £50 in charges pending from the previous months, and so it continued. i managed to open another high street bank, and through the help of this website claim £270.00 back from abbey. i have since closed the abbey account and continued with my new one which is going smoothly.
the problems i have is that i would like to take out a loan to purchase a new car, i am looking for a small amount, as every penny counts in my opinion.
i am on the electoral roll at my parents house in norfolk, but my new account is in my address in north yorkshire, which due to my partners work is on a holiday park, i have had my current account for about 3 months, and have been refused credit cards and loans before, but have 2 mobile phone contracts with no late payments in the last 6 months.
im just curious as i have a meeting on thursday to see a personal banking advisor about a loan, and wonder if i have a chance of obtaining one?
apparantly there is a mark on my bank account to apply, but its not a straight no!
i just want to know how i can help my credit if i cant get my foot on the ladder - so to speak!!
sorry for the essay and please be gentle
piper5

Wannabe_Moneysaver_3

Wannabe_Moneysaver wrote:

Hi, I'm new to this site and having read several threads I wish I'd discovered it a long time ago. Still better late than never, so here goes. I hope you can shed some light on this for me and please excuse me if this is a rather long post.

I've had an Egg credit card for several years now and apart from the odd charge for exceeding my limit (only by a couple of £s at the most, and usually at Xmas) I've always paid over the minimum payment on time.
I thought I was on their standard APR of around 16.9% however when I was checking my account online I noticed it had increased to a whopping 21.9% without them telling me.
I contacted them to ask why my rate was so high and when had it changed and this is the reply they sent me.

"Your new rate of 21.9% has been changed to reflect the relationship you have with Egg. Our assessment of your position includes an understanding of your borrowing outside of Egg and also takes into consideration information made available via external credit reference agencies."

I have had credit problems with another company which could not be resolved with them and ended up with me currently having a CCJ, and I do have an overdraft and a couple of store cards but I have a regular reasonable salary and the other cards are all upto date with payments. Although I know my CCJ will be on file with the credit reference agencies, I didn't think they informed other creditors of actual details they hold. My current debt with Egg is just under £10,000 so the interest each month is a huge amount and due to my CCJ there's no point in me looking around for a loan or another card with a lower APR.

Can Egg increase their interest rate so much without informing me and do you have any advice of what I should do next?

Yours hopefully.

Hi again Mike thanks for your help.
Just to update you on my situation. I've had my Egg statement today and thanks to the hike in interest charges (which they never told me about) the interest on my account this month has put me over my limit and Egg have very kindly added an overlimit charge on top of that. Even though I paid an extra £50 to my account (which still hasn't been credited even though I made the payment on the 15th) it still wouldn't have been enough to keep me below my limit thanks to the whopping amount of interest.
And thanks to Eggs charging policy, even though it was their interest & charges that put me over my limit, they will count it that as we are now in the next statement period, I am over my limit again and I will get another overlimit charge added to my account next month.
How on earth do they expect people to pay the card off?

ccjbegone

ccjbegone wrote:

First of all a big THANKS to you :-) You deserve about a 1000 pints for this free advice

Ok - I have full electoral roll going back 3 years - the ER at my current address is only for the last month though, and I moved in 10 months ago. The ER info at my last address takes me up to last month though - will that overlap be Ok?

Re: Virgins explanation, they said there was "no bad stuff but not enough good stuff" which I thought was a nice way to let me down gently . I'm going to call them back with the Electoral Roll information - let's see what they say.

The reason for the low debt-to-income ratio is that I currently pay discounted rent at my mates flat that that she is currently redecorating. If I was paying the normal rate i calculated it at 24% - is that still OK?

Thanks again, Mike.. I'm feeling a bit better about myself now, all thanks to you

willowanne

Hi Mike,
hope you can advise..........I'll try to keep it short but I tend to waffle

A&L charged me £34 for an unexpected debit which put me over my overdraft limit and I didn't know this had happened (I was on holiday) . I didn't put money in to cover the deficit for two weeks so they also charged me 2 x £25 later.
Anyway, the upshot is I have a double default on my credit report from A&L. Is it worth writing to A&L to ask them to put a note in or remove the default since it was their (unlawful) charges that made the problem in the first place? I'd like to claim the charges back and ask for the default removed offically but I can't afford the overdraft if they close my account on me.
I have another late payment notice in my credit report from barclay but this was because I gave them the wrong sort code on the direct debit form and didn't realise til they wrote and told me I hadn't paid. if I expleained would they remove it?
I've had loans, credit cards, shop cards and overdrafts for over 25 years and never had a late payment or bad credit problem. Now I can't get a credit card or overdraft from anyone and am stuck with high interest credit cards when I would change immediately.
thanks for any advice you can give

TBeckett100

Hi Mike

My credit report shows two defaults, one with orange (which i am fighting cos they didnt tell the debt collectors about my address change) both amounts settled and under £150. will this be a problem.

The problem i can see on my file apart from the odd late payment is the number of searches. how do past searches i.e. 20plus in a year affect things?

Thanks

willowanne

Hi Mike,
hope you can advise..........I'll try to keep it short but I tend to waffle

A&L charged me £34 for an unexpected debit which put me over my overdraft limit and I didn't know this had happened (I was on holiday) . I didn't put money in to cover the deficit for two weeks so they also charged me 2 x £25 later.
Anyway, the upshot is I have a double default on my credit report from A&L. Is it worth writing to A&L to ask them to put a note in or remove the default since it was their (unlawful) charges that made the problem in the first place? I'd like to claim the charges back and ask for the default removed offically but I can't afford the overdraft if they close my account on me.
I have another late payment notice in my credit report from barclay but this was because I gave them the wrong sort code on the direct debit form and didn't realise til they wrote and told me I hadn't paid. if I expleained would they remove it?
I've had loans, credit cards, shop cards and overdrafts for over 25 years and never had a late payment or bad credit problem. Now I can't get a credit card or overdraft from anyone and am stuck with high interest credit cards when I would change immediately.
thanks for any advice you can give

jimmackman

Hi there

I am on a 12 months int free credit card deal. I have transferred all my debts on to this card and can afford to pay off about £5-600 per month. the total debt is about £9,000. My question is: I have nearly finished a loan for my wifes new car and the company keep offering me another loan beacaude I have obviously been a good payer, my question is should I take up the offer as I have been paying £240 per month on the car loan or should i pay off the loan at the rate of 5-600 until the int free period expires then think about getting a loan or transfer again to another int free card