How many credit cards do you have?

Volcane

Three, and all Barclaycards

1) Platinum Cashback (from 2008) that gives me 2% Cashback at supermarkets and fuel.

2) Cashbachback Duo of which I use the Amex card for anywhere not in point 1 above and is linked to PayPal. Was originally Egg Money waaaaay back.

3) Hilton Hhonors which I use for at relevant hotels for business and leisure.

This way I get some form of reward whenever I use a card.

planteria

interesting Volcane, you wouldn't be able to get them all now..
i didn't know there were still 2%ers in use. i hope that continues for you.

enthusiasticsaver

I currently have 2.


Santander 123 credit card for fuel, supermarket and department store spending. 3% on fuel cashback, 2% on department store spends and 1% on supermarket spends. I pay it off in full every month and usually get between £4 and £7 per month cashback although there is a fee. My annual fee is paid up until November 2016 and if I do not get at least the £36 fee in cashback I shall be cancelling it then.


The other one is with John Lewis Partnership card and I use it for larger items which are not eligible for cashback through the Santander 123 card so long as there is not a credit card fee. Usually it is just large items from Amazon or sometimes I use it for meals out or hotel bills. Again it is paid off in full every month. The cashback comes in the form of vouchers to use in Waitrose.

KJLilac

I only have one credit card, (and sometime I struggle to pay that off!) - personally I don't think I could cope with any more cards to try and remember to pay them off!
Definitely take advantage of the 0% purchase rate - when mine is up I will be cutting up the card and taking out a new one.
Although - having said all of that I am about to renovate my first home...so maybe it's an idea to keep the card and just take out a another one!!!

Scarpacci

I have four active cards at the moment, which is the most I've had (so far) at any one point. I did close an old 0% purchases card just as I opened my latest one, mainly to keep my available credit limit down somewhat.

I have two standard, non-promotional cards which are paid off in full each month and just used for regular day-to-day spending. I have one 0% (no-fee) balance transfer card which came from the aforementioned closed 0% purchases card. And the latest is a 0% purchases card which so far has no purchases on it, but will be used for bigger ticket spending over its run.

planteria

KJLilac wrote: »

...personally I don't think I could cope with any more cards to try and remember to pay them off!

in that case i would have a Direct Debit in place. if you can't afford to set this up for the full amount, then set it for the minimum payment, thereby ensuring you will never forget and miss a payment, and then throw as much as you can at the remainder of the balance. getting sucked into bad debt is very easy. be very disciplined with your spending...just buy what you absolutely need, until you get on top of it. good luck.

mathewsmith

I have 2, and one pay-as-you-go. I wish I didn't have the first two. Hence why I just signed up here.

Barclaycard - was formally and Egg. 700/700
M&S - 3200/3500
And, a Skrill pay-as-you-go - trying to use this one now.

funkysi

I have 3, however shortly to be 2 (those two being low interest cards). The one I am closing is the Granite credit card that I got many many moons ago when my credit rating and financial wellbeing fell apart. I now have a perfect credit score (as near as damn it) and my other credit cards have a combined balance of a few hundred quid.


I think having 2 is probably the optimum (but who am I to say)! I think having a credit card with your bank and then having a separate one is probably the safest option - I do a lot of travelling and it's nice to have the flexibility should something go wrong.


I personally don't want anymore than 2. The minimum payments alone if both cards reached their limit are more than enough to put me off having anymore. I also don't want to be tied in to any sort of rewards programme or whatever. Barclaycard periodically do the 0% offers I really need.


I run almost ALL of my financial business from my current account and use savings where necessary and focus everything on debit rather than credit. I will use my credit cards for periodical purchases, occasional online shopping where I can't use PayPal to make the purchase and overseas travel and that's pretty much it.

Volcane

planteria wrote: »

interesting Volcane, you wouldn't be able to get them all now..
i didn't know there were still 2%ers in use. i hope that continues for you.

Yes me too lol, will not cancel it given there's no current equivalent.

Had they not converted my Egg Money to the Cashback duo (via a brief stint as a world MasterCard first) they may have converted this instead.

planteria

funkysi wrote: »

...I also don't want to be tied in to any sort of rewards programme or whatever. Barclaycard periodically do the 0% offers I really need.

I run almost ALL of my financial business from my current account and use savings where necessary and focus everything on debit rather than credit...

fair enough.. but you do miss out on points/cashback as a result, and also don't 'Spend & Repay & Spend & Repay' when you buy your groceries/fuel, as you would do if you bought your essentials on a creditcard and then paid in full by Direct Debit. doing so can improve your credit worthiness. if that appeals.

and yes, cling on to it Volcane. 2% is top class.