Halifax Clarity - can I pay off / pay in early

stevenfayers

Hi

Anyone have the Halifax Clarity card for overseas spending?

I see that interested is charged immediately for cash withdrawals. I was wondering if I pay money in before the statement date does the interest get reduced?
And, if I pre-paid money into the credit card to have a positive balance, then take money out, can I avoid interest charges altogether?

Cheers
Steven

jackieblack

stevenfayers wrote: »

Hi

Anyone have the Halifax Clarity card for overseas spending?

I see that interested is charged immediately for cash withdrawals. I was wondering if I pay money in before the statement date does the interest get reduced?

You can make a payment as soon as the transaction 'hits' your account. Some people do this by online banking, some pre-arrange a payment for a ceratin date before they go away, some wait until they get home. Interst is charged daily so this will reduce the interest you're charged but the charges are minimal (compared to other kinds of currency transaction) and it depends if you're that bothered about saving a pound or two while away on holiday.

stevenfayers wrote: »

And, if I pre-paid money into the credit card to have a positive balance, then take money out, can I avoid interest charges altogether?

You may find your card blocked if you try this as pre-loading is against the t&c
See 16.9 http://www.halifax.co.uk/creditcards/low-rate-no-fee/clarity-card/terms/

benjus

There are plenty of reasons that a card could be taken into credit through no intention on the customer's part - for example, customer buys something, pays off the card, then decides to return it and the shop issues a refund to the card. So having a credit balance in itself should not be grounds to block the card.

However, repeatedly putting it into credit may trigger a review of the account by a human being, who may then decide that a block or other action is warranted.

Doshwaster

The main reason for not putting a large amount of money onto the card as a credit is that if there is a problem (it is lost, stolen, blocked etc) then it could be hard to get the money back. To save a few pence in interest, is it really worth the risk?

I've often had my Clarity card slightly in credit as I have estimated the amount of interest that was due before the statement arrived but it is never more than a pound or two. I wouldn't want to load several hundred pounds onto it.

jackieblack

benjus wrote: »

There are plenty of reasons that a card could be taken into credit through no intention on the customer's part - for example, customer buys something, pays off the card, then decides to return it and the shop issues a refund to the card. So having a credit balance in itself should not be grounds to block the card.

Indeed, but 16.9 specifically refers to making payments, rather than being in credit by virtue of a refund.
There have been several reports on here and other forums of people this has happened to over the last few years (and happened to someone I work with).
The OP may feel differently, but to me it's not worth the risk to save a small amount of interest when that is offset by the improved rate of exchange anyway

dzug1

I suspect that some at least of those who have such an aversion to paying a trivial amount of interest pay more in internet access charges to make those extra payments than they save.

NFH

dzug1 wrote: »

I suspect that some at least of those who have such an aversion to paying a trivial amount of interest pay more in internet access charges to make those extra payments than they save.

I never pay "internet access charges" when travelling, other than local SIM cards for the data connectivity I need anyway. For people who don't need constant connectivity, they will almost certainly experience free wifi more often than they visit a cash machine.

dzug1

NFH wrote: »

I never pay "internet access charges" when travelling, other than local SIM cards for the data connectivity I need anyway. For people who don't need constant connectivity, they will almost certainly experience free wifi more often than they visit a cash machine.

Well I did say 'some' - and it was a bit tongue in cheek anyway

KingL

On a related question. If, in a given month, I have made a fresh £500 (shop purchase) on the card and then I do a ~£100 ATM withdrawal, and I make an early payment of £100 by online banking - does the payment get allocated to the ATM withdrawal or the shop purchase ?

The back of the statement says

Allocation of payments: If you don't pay your balance in full we will allocate payments to balances with the highest interest rates before balances with lower interest rates.

but that doesn' t really help, since both transactions have the same interest rate - its just that the ATM txn incurs interest from day 1.

jackieblack

KingL wrote: »

On a related question. If, in a given month, I have made a fresh £500 (shop purchase) on the card and then I do a ~£100 ATM withdrawal, and I make an early payment of £100 by online banking - does the payment get allocated to the ATM withdrawal or the shop purchase ?

The back of the statement says
but that doesn' t really help, since both transactions have the same interest rate - its just that the ATM txn incurs interest from day 1.

I've done exactly this and the payment got allocated to the purchases. I was told I would have had to repay in full in order to pay off the cash withdrawal.
Interest was only about £1 though

zagfles

KingL wrote: »

On a related question. If, in a given month, I have made a fresh £500 (shop purchase) on the card and then I do a ~£100 ATM withdrawal, and I make an early payment of £100 by online banking - does the payment get allocated to the ATM withdrawal or the shop purchase ?

The back of the statement says
but that doesn' t really help, since both transactions have the same interest rate - its just that the ATM txn incurs interest from day 1.

Cash advances are paid off first - but that rule is trumped by the other rule saying statemented items are always paid before non statemented items.

So in the above example the cash advance would be paid first - provided that it had hit the account, and that the previous statement had already been paid off in full.

This applies even if you've got a DD set up to pay the card. Any cash advance you make between the statement date and the DD date, you cannot pay off until the entire statement is paid off.