NationWide charges on Flex Accounts

pmstephens

I am retired; living on a fixed income, spending some six months of the year in Europe.

I have had a Nationwide Flex account for a number of years and enjoyed the ability to withdraw cash when away from home, free of charge; this is about to change in November. Having looked at the various options, the Halifax Clarity Card seems to offer the best solution in my circumstances.
My question is: if I open a current account with the Halifax and take up the Clarity Card, can I pre-empt withdrawal of cash by transferring money to this card (putting credit on the credit card), thus avoiding the interest charged for cash withdrawal?

YorkshireBoy

In short, no.

http://www.halifax.co.uk/creditcards/conditions_7785.asp (see condition 7.7)

chexum

pmstephens wrote: »

can I pre-empt withdrawal of cash by transferring money to this card (putting credit on the credit card), thus avoiding the interest charged for cash withdrawal?

No - it's against the terms&conditions, sometimes it may work, but an intentional positive balance poses all kinds of problems for the credit company, so they occasionally go to great lengths to prevent it: your purchases may not be covered by the credit regulations and your money is not FSCS insured for a few of the reasons.

If you get the head-of-line 12.9% interest, it's roughly 50p for two weeks for £100, and you can pay it back earlier. Though they don't have faster payments, if you get a current account there as well, it *should* be a same-day internal transfer if you pay online.

dzug1

The answer per the T&C is no.

In reality you might get away with it on the odd occasion for not too large an amount. If you were doing it every month I suspect they'd cotton on.

Metrobank may be for you

fifeken

chexum wrote: »

.... if you get a current account there as well, it *should* be a same-day internal transfer if you pay online.

Not true - the CC payment does not get treated as an internal transfer and takes the same amount of time as if paid from another bank altogether.

chexum

fifeken wrote: »

Not true - the CC payment does not get treated as an internal transfer and takes the same amount of time as if paid from another bank altogether.

I was looking for that specific bit of information, and I heard both sides - can't confirm myself

It doesn't make sense for me to make payments from the same bank to the same bank to go via BACS, but it may very well be the norm.

It may also depend on the sort code of your current account, that you don't really have too much control. I remember one post saying it reached the CC the next day, and showing the payment day.

fifeken

I tried it out by paying from my Halifax current account and from my Lloyds TSB current account. Both payments took the same time to be credited to the CC bill.

YorkshireBoy

fifeken wrote: »

I tried it out by paying from my Halifax current account and from my Lloyds TSB current account. Both payments took the same time to be credited to the CC bill.

What method did you use in Halifax online banking?

I seem to remember (from my own experience) that if you pull it from the credit card online area, rather than push it by 'bill payment' from the current account online area, then the payment appears next day but is backdated to the previous day, ie the day you initiated it.