vanquis ROP (repayment option plan)

vanquisidiot

Hi,

Am new here so apologies if this question has been answered before.

Got a vanquis card, quickly got given a 3000 credit limit and have maxed it out. Very stupid I know. I notice that there is a vanquis ROP where you can freeze the account for two years(including any interest charged).

Unfortuantely, i don't think i ever signed up for this as i see no charge for it on my account under ROP.

My question is, could I now join their Repayment Option Plan then immediately have my account frozen so that no more interest is charged? Terms and conditions apply apparently but i see none of this information on their website.

Note: to join the rop, it will cost me £39 a month. Not sure if i would still have to pay this every month when my account is frozen.

Any help, feedback, would be gratefully received. Cheers.

Update:just noticed that on the 1st of december i withdrew £800, which is wll over the limit of 20% i thought i could withdraw per day. Any thoughts if i could call them up on this?

grumbler

vanquisidiot wrote: »

...Terms and conditions apply apparently but i see none of this information on their website.

http://www.vanquis.co.uk/credit-cards/terms-and-conditions

Second frame: Credit Card Agreement Regulated By The Consumer Credit Act 1974

Paragraph 20.

20. REPAYMENT OPTION PLAN

General
20.1 You may opt-in to the Repayment Option Plan (the 'Plan'). If you do so you will need to pay a Plan Charge which will be calculated and payable in accordance with paragraphs 20.7 - 20.9 below.
20.2 If you opt-in to the Plan you will be entitled, subject to the terms and conditions set out below, to receive all the features of the Plan whether you are in full-time, part-time or temporary employment, are self-employed, or are unemployed or retired. However, the situations in which your Account may be frozen (as described in paragraphs 20.12 - 20.17 below) will depend on your employment status.
20.3 The Plan is not a regulated insurance product and will not pay off any capital or interest on your Account.
20.4 We do not provide advice or a recommendation on whether the Plan is suitable for your purposes.
Opting-in to the Plan
20.5 You may opt-in to the Plan at any time by telling us by telephone or in writing that you wish do so. To do this you may call 0330 099 3010 or write to Customer Service, P.O Box 399 CHATHAM, ME4 4WQ or use any other contact details we give you. If you inform us that you do wish to opt-in to the Plan we will provide you with all of the features of the Plan from the date of the receipt by us of your request whether it is by telephone or in writing.
Cost of the Plan
20.6 The cost of the Plan depends on your personal circumstances.
20.7 If you are in full-time, part-time or temporary employment or are self-employed, the cost of the Plan will be charged at the rate of £1.29 per £100 (1.29% per month) of your monthly outstanding balance as shown on your statement ('the Full Plan Charge'). This is known as the Full Plan.
20.8 If you are not employed (as described in paragraph 20.7) or you are retired, the cost of the Plan will be charged at the rate of £1.19 per £100 (1.19% per month) of your monthly outstanding balance as shown on your statement ('the Standard Plan Charge'). This is known as the Standard Plan.
20.9 We will charge the Full or Standard Plan Charge directly to your Account each month as a Purchase Transaction. The Full or Standard Plan Charge will accrue interest in the same way as other Purchase Transactions.
Features of the Plan
20.10 If you opt-in to the Plan, in return for the Full or Standard Plan Charge but subject to the terms and conditions set out below, we agree:
20.10.1. in the event of a Difficult Financial Circumstance (as defined below) to 'Freeze' your Account (as described in paragraph 20.13) subject to the terms set out in paragraphs 20.12 and 20.14 - 20.17 below;
20.10.2. to allow you to take a 'Payment Holiday' (as described in paragraph 20.18) subject to the terms set out in paragraphs 20.19 - 20.21 below;
20.10.3. to provide you with a 'Lifeline' (as described in paragraphs 20.23) subject to the terms set out in paragraphs 20.22 and 20.24 - 20.25 below;
20.10.4. (subject to your having a mobile telephone capable of receiving such messages and your providing us with its number) to provide you with the 'SMS Text Service' (as described in paragraphs 20.27 - 20.28) subject to the terms set out in paragraphs 20.26 and 20.29 below.

20.11 If you wish to Freeze your Account or take a Payment Holiday you must call the Plan helpline on 0330 099 3010. The Plan helpline is available between 8am and 8pm Monday to Friday and 9am to 5.30pm on Saturday.
Freezing your Account
20.12 We agree that if you experience a Difficult Financial Circumstance (as defined below) and you request us to Freeze your Account by telephoning us in accordance with paragraph 20.11, we will, subject to the terms and conditions set out herein, Freeze your Account for as long as the Difficult Financial Circumstance continues to apply, up to a maximum period of 24 months per event (or series of connected events).
20.13 If we Freeze your Account in accordance with the terms of the Plan that means that:
20.13.1 you will not be able to use your Card or Account;
20.13.2 we will not charge you interest on any outstanding balance under your Account
20.13.3 you will not be obliged to make any Repayments
20.13.4 you will not be liable to pay any Fees or Charges.

20.14 After the Difficult Financial Circumstance ceases to apply or after 24 months (whichever is sooner), you will be able to use your Card or Account but interest will accrue again and you will be obliged to continue your Repayments and pay any applicable Fees and Charges that accrue on the Account.
20.15 If you request us to Freeze your Account you must provide us with reasonable evidence of the occurrence of the Difficult Financial Circumstance when you contact us to Freeze the Account and you must continue to supply us, on request by us, with reasonable evidence of the continuation of the Difficult Financial Circumstance at any time while your Account is Frozen. If you do not do so, we may terminate the Freezing of your Account.
20.16 You agree that if you wish us to Freeze your Account as a result of any Difficult Financial Circumstance and you have notified us within 90 days of its first occurrence and provided us with reasonable evidence as required under paragraph 20.15, any Freezing of your Account will be backdated to the date of the first occurrence of that Difficult Financial Circumstance. Where first notification of such Difficult Financial Circumstance is made more than 90 days after its first occurrence and you have provided us with reasonable evidence as required under paragraph 20.15, any Freezing of your Account will be backdated to the date of notification of that Difficult Financial Circumstance.

Difficult Financial Circumstance
20.17 In relation to both the Standard Plan and the Full Plan 'Difficult Financial Circumstance' means the occurrence of one of the events listed below or the occurrence of more than one of the events listed below in a series of connected events:
20.17.1 you become sick, disabled or have an accident which affects your ability to make your repayments; or
20.17.2 you have to stay in hospital because of a medical condition; or
20.17.3 you have to attend jury service; or
20.17.4 your main home is significantly damaged by a natural disaster e.g., flooding; or
20.17.5 your partner (who you have lived with for more than 6 months) or an immediate family member (sibling, parent, spouse or child) dies;
and in relation to the Full Plan 'Difficult Financial Circumstance' means also:
20.17.6 you become unemployed involuntarily (other than as a result of your own misconduct or by reason of your retirement) or by reason of redundancy including non-compulsory redundancy; or
20.17.7 you are put on short-time working or laid-off reducing your usual weekly hours of work by 25% or more; or
20.17.8 you are self-employed and have suffered a reduction in weekly income by 25% or more through loss or non-renewal of contracts or work;
20.17.9 you take leave from work to care for a partner (who you have lived with for more than 6 months) or a member of your immediate family (sibling, parent, spouse or child) and suffer loss of income; or
20.17.10 you go on maternity, paternity or adoption leave.

Payment Holiday
20.18 A Payment Holiday means that you will not be obliged to make your next Minimum Repayment on the Repayment Due Date.
20.19 We agree that we will allow you to take a Payment Holiday under the terms of the Plan if:-
20.19.1 your Account has been open for at least 6 months; and
20.19.2 you have not taken a Payment Holiday on your Account which allowed you to miss making either of the last two Minimum Repayments on your Account; and
20.19.3 a Lifeline has not been used in respect of either of the last two Minimum Repayments on your Account; and
20.19.4 you have not already taken a Payment Holiday at any time in the current Customer Account Year; and
20.19.5 your Account is not and has not at any time within the last 2 months been subject to a payment arrangement agreed with us under which you have made repayments lower than those which would have been due under the terms and conditions of your Account; and
20.19.6 your Account is not frozen under the Plan in accordance with paragraphs 20.12 - 20.17; and
20.19.7 you are not in breach of the terms and conditions of your Account.

20.20 If you wish to take a Payment Holiday and are eligible under paragraph 20.19, you must contact us to request it before midday on the day of your Repayment Due Date or, if that day falls on a non-working day, you must contact us to request it before midday on the last working day before that non-working day. If you do so and you are eligible for a Payment Holiday we will allow you to miss making the Minimum Repayment on the Repayment Due Date.
20.21 Interest will continue to accrue on your Account and will not be suspended during any Payment Holiday.
Lifeline
20.22 We agree that if you do not make your Minimum Repayment on your Account by the Repayment Due Date we will provide a Lifeline on your Account if:-
20.22.1 your Account has been open for at least 6 months; and
20.22.2 you have not taken a Payment Holiday on your Account which allowed you to miss making either of the last two Minimum Repayments on your Account; and
20.22.3 your Account is not and has not at any time within the last 2 months been subject to a payment arrangement agreed with us under which you have made repayments lower than those which would have been due under the terms and conditions of your Account; and
20.22.4 you have not already had a Lifeline provided on your Account at any time in the current Customer Account Year; and
20.22.5 a Lifeline has not been provided in respect of either of the last two Minimum Repayments on your Account; and
20.22.6 your Account is not frozen under the Plan in accordance with paragraphs 20.12 - 20.17; and
20.22.7 you are not in breach of the terms and conditions of your Account.

20.23 If you are eligible for a Lifeline on your Account, that means that we will:
20.23.1 notify you that we have provided you with a Lifeline on your Account;
20.23.2 suspend your Account so that you will not be able to use your Card or Account until we have received the Minimum Repayment which you have not paid;
20.23.3 suspend your obligation to make your Minimum Repayment (to which the Lifeline relates) on the Repayment Due Date in accordance with the terms of paragraph 20.24 below;
20.23.4 waive or refund any Late Payment Charge or Over Limit Charge that you would have had to pay, as a result of your failure to make any Minimum Repayment, if the Lifeline had not been provided to you; and
20.23.5 subject to you meeting your obligations under paragraph 20.24, report your Account as 'current' when we next report the performance of your Account to credit reference agencies.

20.24 Following the provision of a Lifeline, you must pay the Minimum Repayment you have missed and to which the Lifeline applies before the next Repayment Due Date for making a Minimum Repayment on your Account. If you do this the suspension of your Account under paragraph 20.23.2 will cease as from the next working day following the date the payment reaches your account. If you fail to do this and you also fail to make the next Minimum Repayment on your Account by the Repayment Due Date applicable to that Minimum Repayment, the suspension of your Account will continue and we will report to credit reference agencies that you have missed those two payments.
20.25 While your Account is suspended following the provision of a Lifeline:
20.25.1 interest will continue to accrue on your Account;
20.25.2 you will continue to be liable for all Charges and Fees apart from those which have been specifically waived or refunded under paragraph 20.23.4.

vanquisidiot

Guess i'm screwed then since i'm still employed......unless they consider difficult circumstances being the high interest they charge on their card!!! (Which they clearly do not state).

Thanks anyway.....any thoughts on lending me more than 20% of my limit on a specific day? I read somewhere that they can change this but I never received this in writing.

Cheers.

grumbler

In the first place it's you borrowed, not they lent.
Stop looking for anybody to blame for your own actions. This hardly makes any real difference whether it was over one day or two days.

thebritishbloke

As Grumbler has said, you're not going to find a way out of repaying what you borrowed.

Guessing you got a Vanquis card because you can't get accepted for other prime deals?

fil_cad

The trouble with vanquis, they chuck money at any poor flukker, then try and get you to take a cash advance, then phone you up and pester you to take the robbing option plan, cleverly re worded from PPI, then chuck plenty more cash at you to spend, and when you find you are struggleing to pay it, thet give you more credit, and more, and when you can't afford to repay they give you hell by ringing you all day long and every day on your mobile/work/home telephone numbers, Vanquis are the scum of the earth and will bleed most people bone dry till they die.

[Deleted User]

Or until they pay back what they owe.

SnowTiger

fil_cad wrote: »

The trouble with vanquis, they chuck money at any poor flukker, then try and get you to take a cash advance, then phone you up and pester you to take the robbing option plan, cleverly re worded from PPI, then chuck plenty more cash at you to spend, and when you find you are struggleing to pay it, thet give you more credit, and more, and when you can't afford to repay they give you hell by ringing you all day long and every day on your mobile/work/home telephone numbers, Vanquis are the scum of the earth and will bleed most people bone dry till they die.

A personal story?

The person who applies for the card, accepts the cash advance, opts for ROP (which isn't PPI), accept the credit limit increases, spends up to their limit, then decides they don't want to pay anything back is completely blameless?

An internal Vanquis document highlighted here sometime ago suggested that Vanquis rejects at least half those who apply for a card and has a lower level of defaulters than main stream card issuers. Vanquis also hasn't had to cough up millions of pounds in PPI compensation either.

MisterBaxter

fil_cad wrote: »

The trouble with vanquis, they chuck money at any poor flukker, then try and get you to take a cash advance, then phone you up and pester you to take the robbing option plan, cleverly re worded from PPI, then chuck plenty more cash at you to spend, and when you find you are struggleing to pay it, thet give you more credit, and more, and when you can't afford to repay they give you hell by ringing you all day long and every day on your mobile/work/home telephone numbers, Vanquis are the scum of the earth and will bleed most people bone dry till they die.

I had a Vanquis card for a while. I spent on it regularly and paid it back in full each month meaning no interest. They offered me the ROP which I politely declined so no costs there either. I found them to be no better and no worse than any other card providers. As with all credit it is down to the borrower to responsible. Their interest rates are high but they never hid this, again it is easy to see what you will be paying and if you can't pay then don't borrow.

I've had issues in the past, hence the need to start over with a sub-prime card but I always knew that the problem was mine and not the lenders. Borrowing to get out of debt simply isn't the answer but neither is blaming the lender.

m4rc

vanquisidiot wrote: »

......unless they consider difficult circumstances being the high interest they charge on their card!!! (Which they clearly do not state)

It's not exactly a marketing plus but even so they really don't hide it - go to their website - vanquis.co.uk - and the biggest text by far on the whole page says '39.9%'.

I guess they could have made it flashing and had big arrows pointing to it....

I know how hard it can be getting into debt so you have my sympathy, however tryin to blame everyone else and anything else is pointless. YOU did this, you can't blame them, but you can try and work it out. First off cut up the card and don't apply for anymore credit unless it's a good balance transfer deal to help with this debt. Then work out what the minimum payments will be and pay a little more. On 39.9% you are looking at 2.8375% monthly, so on £3000 debt if you paid £100 a month you would be paying off £15 more than the minimum amount per month and it will be clear in 5 years 9 months. Make it £125 a month and it will be clear is 3 years 5 months. Make it £150 and the debt will be gone in 2 years 6 months. £200 and its 20 mons until it's gone.

I'm assuming as you asked the question and are so annoyed by it you are struggling to meet the minimum payments, but for the sake of your future credit chances you need to try. If you can juggle things around, reduce costs, trim bills, maybe get a 2nd job, you can reduce the interest you will pay back. Remember that your minimum payments will fall as the debt shrinks, so do your best to pay more in the beginning then you can take the pressure off a little later yhe minimum payment on 3k is £85 a month, the minimum on 2k is £57 and he minimum on 1k is £28.

Please check all your own figures, I may have the numbers wrong and your amounts will vary depending on your specific interest rates.

Ultimately it's 3k, it's a small amount compared to the debts many have, you will get through it, and it is a good lesson to learn and is a lot better that you have got into a muddle owing 3k than 33k. But you do need to take responsibility for your decisions and actions, nobody forced you to have a card, spend on it or accept limit increases, I bet you were very happy to recieve the card and liked getting the increases. Vanquis are not cheap but they are not dodgy, they are not the nicest people in the world but they are a credit company, not your friends. This isn't some kind of dodgy payday loan with thousand % + APR.

Good luck sorting things out

Nearlynot_skint

I have just cancelled my R.O.P, I was on the phone less than 4 minutes, no hassle, they only asked why once & did not argue. Happy now I've 'saved' £30 a month!!