Barclaycard "typical" loan rate

Mutton_Geoff

I applied for a Barclaycard personal loan (through the link on this site) and was attracted to their 5.6% "typical" APR. I'm fortunate with a secure, well paid job, no adverse credit history, 20+ years of holding a Barclaycard, no other debts apart from a balance transfer on the Barclaycard that part of the loan was intended to clear. Plenty of other high credit scoring points (at least so I thought).

Got the loan approved, paperwork back and the APR had been hiked to 7.7%. No longer an attractive deal and £1,000 more expensive over the term of the loan.

Rang Barclaycard and asked them to justify their "typical" APR statement when I'd just been offered a deal at 50% higher than their "typical" rate. They were arrogant on the phone, said 7.7% was an excellent rate, couldn't comment on why I'd not been offered 5.6%, wouldn't tell me what percentage of their customers actually got the 5.6% offer etc.

They put me through to their "complaints" department who were just as unhelpful and so the loan offer went into the shredder. I have another line of credit (at 5.5% but I wanted the security and structure of a loan at 5.6%) so the first stop is to pay the Barclaycard off and ditch it.

Has anyone been successful at actually getting the "typical" rate? Looking through my Experian record, there is one late payment on my Barclaycard in last 12 months (I was abroad) and until 3 months ago always paid the full balance off each month. Apart from the late charges, interest accrued etc on the card that month, they now want to penalise me another £1,000 for the oversight?

Would be interested if anyone else has had a similar experience with Barclaycard?

enjoyincubus

A third of applicants must be offered the typical rate, the other two thirds can be offered whichever price Barclaycard feel. This is the same for all lenders.

Some lenders are trying to work on methods of telling you which APR you will get before you go through the full application and thus get a credit search, because if you start shopping around you would end up with lots of searches on your credit file. I know this doesn't help you now, but this is a big issue as two thirds of people don't end up getting the rate they applied for.