wonga vs vanquis

redsaxon

Hi im after a little advice/guidance,ive got myself into a fortnightly spiral with wonga which i want to end asap.
Ive just received my vanquis credit card which i know isnt perfect but heres my plan.
Each fortnight i repay wonga around £200 and almost immediately reborrow the same amount as were on benefits and the £200 is close to all we recieve,and as you can imagine this is ever increasing.
My aim is to repay wonga a week on monday and instead of retaking the loan use the vanquis card to withdraw £200 and plan on repaying £60 per month till this amount is clear

In my head this plan seems to work, i know i will incur high interest and charges for withdrawal etc but the aim is to remove wonga from our lives and instead make regular monthly payments,and in the long term reduce the amount were paying in interest until were no longer dependant on any kind of credit.
As this is in my head and im flaky at the best of times id like some feedback/critisism from you lovely people here..many thanks

Plxply

You're just replacing credit, ultimately and by taking out a credit card with Vanquis you will increase the amount of available credit you have. How did you get into this problem with Wonga? I think it's more important that you get advice on how to ensure this doesn't happen again, you can go over to the debt board and explain there or I would recommend calling here:

http://www.cccs.co.uk/

Apart from that I'm guessing you repay Wonga £231 every 14 days, if you're withdrawing on the credit card I don't think you will reduce your outgoings by that much especially if your interest rates are around the 60% area. Ultimately I think this is a bad idea and you're trying to put a plaster on a bigger problem.

redsaxon

it started with a £50 loan but we were soon needing to borrow more and more to make up the fortnightly loss,i know its a mess but for us right now were paying wonga around £30-£40 per fortnight in fees and interest.Then needing to reborrow that little bit extra each fortnight.
We dont intend to use the vanquis card ever again,just to get us through the forthnight and break this dependance on wonga.
At the moment were totally dependant on wonga to lend us the money we need to get through to the next fortnight, and by replacing the huge payment each fortnight with a smaller monthly payment over say 6 months im hoping to get us out of this mess

redsaxon

Just done the math and from the date of initial loan( 4.11.11) to present we have paid a total of £148.26 in fees and interest,thats in just 3 months and guess it answers my own question lol
that sum x 4 would = £593.04 fees and interest in 12 months
Unless im doing my math wrong it would be far cheaper to repay vanquis £200 with regular monthly payments of £60 and thus get wonga out the picture forever(and yes the vanquis will be destroyed as soon as the £200 has been withdrawn)

sharpy2010

Your theory WILL work. Withdraw the money from Vanquis, and pay it to Wonga. THEN DO NOT USE WONGA AGAIN. Pay £60 to Vanquis each month until the debt is gone. THEN DO NOT USE VANQUIS EVER AGAIN.

If you follow these steps, you will sort yourself out no problem. If you do it in ANY OTHER WAY you will just become more and more miserable.

I hope this helps, and good luck!

KILL_BILL

also as soon as you have withdrawn the cash cut up the card

D34N

Sorry if I'm missing something, Why not pay Wonga off with the credit card to save on the cash advance fee's?

Plxply

D34N wrote: »

Sorry if I'm missing something, Why not pay Wonga off with the credit card to save on the cash advance fee's?

I'm more worried about how OP got into this situation, I'm concerned that having access to a credit card may lead to the same problem again.

[Deleted User]

OP is trying to get themself out of a trap and Vanquis may be a way to play it, if no other avenues exist...

I noticed in with my latest Vanquis statement there was a leaflet about 'cash advance' on your credit balance with Vanquis - it is a golden colour leaflet and I remember being asked as part of the application if I wanted a cash advance I'm sure,
so you could have funds transferred directly straight to your bank account rather then mess about withdrawing - plus it does say there is 'no cash advance fee'!!
You will need to call the Vanquis Gold Service freephone 0800 023 7137 and ask for cash advance service, will need your bank sort code and account no in hand

Maybe one way round it OP then destroy the card, be strong and get rid of Wonga once and for all, make payments on time to Vanquis (they send text messages so you don't forget about payments if you don't go for the Direct Debit setup option they can also be quite good with little probs like if you find you need to change a payment date in the future) just get paid up as quick as you can with these to and happier days will soon be here! (trust me I know!)

Good thinking by the way!

As another poster said could also see if Wonga will accept direct credit card payment? I'm sure I read somewhere once that they might?

callum9999

Plxply wrote: »

I'm more worried about how OP got into this situation, I'm concerned that having access to a credit card may lead to the same problem again.

I don't see why it would. If they didn't have access to the credit card they'd still have access to Wonga anyway.

redsaxon

Wonga wont allow repayments to be made using credit cards only debit cards and yes i noticed vanquis will do a free cash transfer to my bank which takes 2-3 days to clear.
As for how i got in this mess.....christmas,enough said lol
Spending above our means in the hope of an enjoyable holiday :beer: