Help

welshrarebit_2

Hi all,

If someone could take the time to help me, I'd really appreciate it. My husband and I are both self-employed and his business has been slow to start but is finally doing well :T but it has been a struggle, wwe have borrowed money from family but we have racked up debt on credit cards and his overdraft his big. We have done a money management course with CAP recently and we are try
ng to get wise with money but I can't get my head around sorting out the cards debt.
We have £2.5k on MBNA and £2k on a John Lewis card and £7k on his natwest overdraft. We are looking to have repayments of £550 a month. Could anyone advise, do we transfer all onto one card, including overdraft, or do we just sort the cards out? We did the MSE calculator and called the CC companies to see if they could reduce their interest rates and MBNA suggested we transfer everything to 'Fluid Card'.

I can't quite believe we have found ourselves here, but it's time to face it and get a grip on it, we've had enough of being controlled by money :mad:
Thank you

geekonthepc

Well done with your efforts so far - you're heading in the right direction. Transferring what you can to an interest free balance transfer card would be a good start, but bear in mind (in general) you can only transfer other CC balances - NOT an overdraft balance. At the moment, your minimum payments will be excessive so I'd look to transferring the balances on the two cards to one interest free card.

As for the overdraft, that's more difficult. You can get "super balance transfer" cards which allow you to use your credit card to transfer money to your bank account - but these are rare and can be considered very dangerous.

I'd focus on finding a good balance transfer deal - pay that off bit by bit within the interest free period until it is clear. With any money left, wind up that overdraft. It might be worth talking to Natwest directly to see if they can do anything to help with your overdraft.

Most importantly though - if you get a balance transfer card, DO NOT be tempted to spend on it. Keep it locked away and just use it for interest avoidance.

YorkshireBoy

You won't be able to BT the MBNA debt to a Fluid Card, as that's also run by MBNA. You could do a 'money transfer' (4%) on a Fluid Card and pay off both MBNA and your O/D, but MBNA may prefer not to extend your facilities further than the £2K you already have with them.

The card debts should be (relatively) easy to get on 0%, by BTing to other cards outside the HSBC and MBNA stables. The O/D is a little more difficult due to the reduced number of providers offering 'money transfers' at 0%, so maybe you should get some long 0% on purchases cards and spend your way out of the overdraft?

You should be a little worried by the size of that O/D, being as it could be recalled at anytime with very little notice...so you may wish to concentrate your efforts there first.

Re your debt repayments, £550 on £11K represents just under 5%, meaning you will be reducing the debt significantly...providing you don't sit back and rest on minimum payments only!

welshrarebit_2

Thank you so much, this is so helpful, it's a minefield out there.

I've been doing some online debt forms tonight and they are coming back more positive than I thought it would be.

My gut instinct was to try and pay the overdraft off than take out more cards, so this is great, thanks you again :j

matty747

I would seek some professional advice from citizens advice or a debt counselor, given that your debts are beginning to become unmanageable is transferring to another card storing up problems for later. There are lots of different solutions but a professional is best placed to review what is best in your situation