Wanting to transfer £12,500k to 0% CC - questions

picklednut

Hi

Myself and my husband have two credit cards between us with Yorkshire Bank with an APR of 21.4%.

There is £7500 on my husband's card and £5000 my card. We want to try to reduce the debt and transfer onto lower or 0% cards to reduce the interest paid.

Realistically we would be looking at trying to clear the debts within the next 2-3 years.

So here's the questions:

1) Are we best applying for separate credit cards to deal with each debt separately? Even though we are "joint" on our credit history?
2) Are we best trying to get 0% balance transfers or the lower APR "life of balance" transfers?
3) What happens if we only get say £1000 limit on our new 0% cards? Is worth only transferring this amount as then we've got 3 credit cards to try and pay off rather than two?
4) In which order do you pay your credit card payments?

eg if we have 1) Yorkshire Bank Card 1 = £6500 (after £1000 transfer)
2) Yorkshire Bank Card 2 = £4000 (after £1000 transfer)
3) 0% transfer card 1 = £1000
4) 0% transfer card 2 = £1000

What do you try to pay the most off? Eg would you only pay the minimum payment on the 0% cards and try and pay off as much as you can on the Yorkshire Bank once? eg. if we scraped together £500 extra one month where should be pay this off

5) Can you apply for more than one 0% card each? Would this ruin our credit rating?
6) Finally what happens if we are getting to the end of the 0% transfer period and still have say £900 on each of the cards and cannot find a new 0% card which will let us transfer £900 to it? How much interest will we end up paying?

Thanks all in advance for your help

[Deleted User]

You won't get a £12k card in one hit. So -

Check your credit reports - how likely are you each to get a card?
If you don't get the full £12k, it's your choice if you want to save some money, or none at all. If 3 cards will be too complicated for you, you probably shouldn't be using credit cards. Set up DDs so you don't miss payments.
Always pay the most of the highest interest card you have.
If you haven't cleared your balance before the end of the 0% period, you'll start paying interest at the go to rate on that card.

Bear in mind, that if you're struggling to clear the balance at present, you may not be a prime candidate for a 0% card.