3 card dilemma - Which to pay?

creditcardnewbie

Hello to you all,

I am asking a question on behalf of a friend as I am unable to advise what he should do.

The story is as follows - he has 3 credit cards:

1) Bank of Ireland Mastercard - APR 16.9% Credit limit £3,000 Current balance £2,900

2) Barclaycard Platinum - APR 24.9% Credit limit £3,000 Current balance £2,000 (This card is currently closed as Barclaycard were going to increase his APR again - he declined the increase so the card is frozen at 24.9% until paid)

3) Barclaycard Football - APR 14.9% Credit limit £2,000 Current balance £1,800

Now, he has told me that he has £2,000 of savings to play with to pay off towards this debt but is unsure what is the most creative way to use this money.

His initial thought was to pay off the Barclaycard Football and then "hopefully" get a balance transfer offer to transfer over some of the Bank of Ireland balance. He is concerned though that if he pays off the balance in full Barclaycard may reduce his credit limit right away.

Not sure what you guys would do in his situation? My advice was to just pay off the Barclaycard Platinum card at 24.9% in full as it would be one less debt to pay each month and he could then pay more off the other 2.

Apologies for the length of the post.

Any feedback at all would be very welcome.

Many thanks,

creditcardnewbie :beer:

choc_mouse

I'd pay off the most expensive debt first - Barclaycard Platinum.

scottishblondie

Pay off the Barclaycard Platinum, it has the highest interest rate so it makes the most sense to get rid of it. After he has closed that, he can pay more to the other 2 cards then in a couple of months he can try for a balance transfer card to move some of the other debt.

Paul_Herring

creditcardnewbie wrote: »

His initial thought was to pay off the Barclaycard Football and then "hopefully" get a balance transfer offer to transfer over some of the Bank of Ireland balance.

He's unlikely to get any BT offer that's worthwhile, if at all.

He is concerned though that if he pays off the balance in full Barclaycard may reduce his credit limit right away.

If he's having difficulty managing credit this way, that wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing.

I'm with the others, pay off the 24.9% card in full, and since it's closed already, there's certainly no temptation to use it afterwards.

Any payments that were going on that card can then be used with a view to reducing, clearing, then cancelling the BOI card since it has the next highest rate.

creditcardnewbie

Hello to you all,

Many thanks for all your replies - I really appreciate it.

Like yourselves I thought myself that it made sense to pay off the highest card too and I will mention that to him again.

Thank you again for taking the time to post,

creditcardnewbie :beer: