credit card help

mark311069

hi all some help needed please,
I have 6 credit cards which total £14500,
every month I make my payments to every card, I never miss a payment, but the apr on the cards is very high so the total of each card is coming down but really slowly, eg my Halifax card apr is 26% the minimum each month £104 but only£5 comes of the total, the other cards are about the same,
I am unable to move any balances to other cards as I get rejected everytime I apply, I cant get a loan as I get rejected for that as well, I have spoken to the card providers but they wont help until I start missing payments, but that's not something I want to do as I know the letters and phone calls will start and then the chance of ever getting credit in the future is gone. so iam feeling a bit stuck, does anybody have any help for me??. I just cant ever see an end to all of these payments to these cards I pay nearly £400 a month to these cards. please help
thank you mark

[Deleted User]

You need to pay as much as you can to them, with minimum payments on all and as much you can to the most expensive.

Try the DFW boards on ways of getting your costs down so you can pay more.

chattychappy

In the meantime, watch out for interest rate hikes - be sure to reject them (though it does mean you won't be able to use the card concerned).

blitzboy

Do you have any room on the card(s) with the lowest APR? If so you could transfer the balance from the card(s) with the highest APR to the ones with the lowest. I know you said they are roughly the same but even if only 1 card is lower and has room available then this will help.

If not then make sure that any over-payments go onto the card with the highest APR first. No point paying of £100 a card at 18% when you've got others at 26%.

I'd suggest going onto the 'Debt Free Wannabe' section of the forum and filling out a SOA. This will let others help and advise where you may be able to cut back on your spending and release extra funds for paying off your debt.

JakeGreen

If you keep applying for cards or loans you'll have too many searches on your file which is another reason for them to reject you.

My advice is:

Don't apply for anything for at least 6 months.

Make sacrifices to your lifestyle over the next 6 months to reduce your outgoings so that you can pay as much as possible on the cards to reduce your debt.

In 6 months apply for a 0% balance transfer card, or a 'rate for life' card with a low interest rate and hopefully you'll get something to take some of the strain so that you can pay off your debt sooner.

I'm assuming you're in full time employment?

Are you on the electoral role and have you checked that your credit files are clean with no missed or late payments recorded on them?

mark311069

hi all iam selfemployed so my income is not fixed month to month.
I do have some room on some of the cards but a while ago they started putting up the intrest rates up so I phoned to say no thank you and they closed the accounts so I am paying these off and they wont let me transfer any money to them.

Tixy

I'd try looking at the snowball calculator and entering all your existing cards and APRs and then seeing how long it will take to clear them at £400 a month and how much that reduces by if you can up it to ssay £450 or £500 a month. http://www.whatsthecost.com/snowball.aspx

If your income varies from month to month, on a higher earning month can you afford to throw extra at the debts?

Or as has been suggested you might want to try filling in a statement of affairs and posting on the debt free wannabe section for people to help you find areas you can reduce your outgoings / get things cheaper etc to get the debts paid off quicker.

If your cards were all at around 26% APR then if you pay off £400 a month it will take 69months to clear a debt of £14500, but putting more towards it each month will bring that down a lot (e.g. a £500 a month that would reduce it to 45months)

Damo999

Keep paying what you can to ensure you are on top of them and not paying any default charges at the same time do not apply for any other type of credit for 6 months.
This should hopefully put you in a much better position to approach your bank and meet with them in branch and ask them to tell you what they could offer you in terms of a loan to consolidate your debt into one payment.
Quite often their own internal credit scoring of you will show them how much they could lend you (in their view what you could afford to repay each month) without the need to submit a credit application.
Not saying it will work or is the best solution out there but it is what I have done as like you I don't want a blemished credit file and at least I have a date in my calender for when I can stop paying off debts. Also being self employed if you do have a good month throw some extra at the loan as it will reduce the overall payment term and often it does not have to be much I sometimes pay an extra £10 or so instead of buying a takeaway. Good luck what ever you decide to do.