Cashplus Credit Builder Nightmare!

sparkle1981_2

My husband applied for a Cashplus Card in order to utilise the Credit Builder function to improve his credit rating.

Initially, it seemed to take ages for the credit builder function to be activated after application and he spoke to someone to get the ball rolling. During that telephone call, he was advised that he had to set up a direct debit for the credit builder function to be activated. This is exactly what he did by giving his normal bank account details and was advised that the credit builder function was now activated and payments would begin to come off on the 6th of each month.

We made sure that there was plenty of money in the account to cover the £5 monthly fee and didn't think much more of it. However, we realised that the £5 fee never did come off and when my husband went to check his credit expert it has a missed payment!

After much confusion, we thought that perhaps the £5 had to be credited directly onto the Cashplus card to then be taken off, rather than them taking the £5 as a direct debit from my husband's account to go onto cashplus. However, this wasn't made clear at the time when my husband was setting up the credit builder and after looking at their T&Cs we can't seem to find clarification of this either.

Has anyone else been in this position and been able to come to an agreement with them regarding making the 'missing' payments and getting any negative marks taken off a credit report?

We're so worried now as it looks like this is going to affect his credit rating considerably over effectivey a mis-understanding and lack of clarity!

Thanks in advance.

BugsyBrowne

Not 100% sure how a credit builder plus card work but I'm pretty sure that the Likes of Vanquis or Capital one classic would've been a better option..

TheGenerus1

I had the Cashplus credit builder account. I had no problems understanding that the Cashplus account had to be topped up with at least the £4.95 required which would be subtracted every month for 12 months.

I did miss the first payment though and had a late payment marker added to my credit file as they did not send me any information as to when the credit building feature would be active and when the first payment should be made.
I explained this to them and they removed the marker.

When you go to the Cashplus credit builder web page it states under the "How Creditbuilder Works" :-

Important note:
Payments must be made on time to avoid damaging your credit rating further, as both on-time and late payments are reported to the credit reference agencies. To avoid this, make sure that your account always has a balance equal to your monthly fee, either £4.95 or £9.95 (see your terms and conditions to confirm your fee).

Maybe you misinterpreted the "your account" part as being your husbands bank account and not the Cashplus account.

Maybe they should have made this bit clearer with the distinction.

CKhalvashi

This isn't the first bad stories I've heard with Cashplus.

As mentioned, all banks offer basic accounts, which if run in a satisfactory way, could open the door to other credit products from that bank, despite a bad credit history.

CK