My cashbuilder credit card whilst still bankcrupt

Johnsmith2016

Hello, due to go bankcrupt soon. Can i get the cashbuilder and icount credit builder cards before i am discharged to get a head start on rebuilding credit?
No credit check. They lend you £60 which you pay back for 12 months... Is there anyone else who does this besides these 2 companies? Will it help?

Cobalt77

Johnsmith2016,

You can get these cards whenever you want, but they will likely have no benefit for you until you've been discharged from BR.

Howver, opinions are divided about whether these cards actually have any material benefit to your credit score at all either. I personally contacted Cashplus a few months back and asked them to show me proof these cards did indeed increase credit scores.Quite surprisingly, they didn't have any!

Now if you think about it, it should be one of the easiest things to prove. Get, say, 20 volunteers who are BR. Ask them all to obtain their credit reports. Next, get one half of the group to take out Cashplus cards (cashplus could reimburse this group the £60). Finally, ask all 20 people to obtain their credit reports 12 months later. If Cashplus are correct, the half with their cards should have materially better credit ratings than the control group.

Last time I looked, Cashplus used a disclaimer along the lines of "Cashplus Creditbuilder could help improve your credit rating" which may just be marketing hype. After all, you could equally say "Watching the Martin Lewis money show could help improve your credit rating" (which is probably more likely, and it's free)

Nowadays, there are at least 10+ different High Street banks which will give you free basic bank accounts. I may be wrong here, but my gut says that having (say) a Natwest basic account probably gives you more points than having a prepaid debit card (like Cashplus) anyway.

But, in the interests of balance, a few people are convinced having a Cashplus card has been beneficial to them. So, it's all down to whether you feel it's worth taking a £60 plus a year punt.

charmed1318

The 'lend' isn't a typical loan. I have Natwest Basic (soon to be 'Foundation') Account and I had the Titanium Card for free when I worked for a company I now don't. My credit is probably the lowest it can go and I applied for the 'Credit builder' function again last year. Nothing has changed, none of the payments were late and in fact I just felt I was 'paying' to have the card. I thought about using it as an extra savings account but I can get the online saver (I have 2, and 2 from the Post Office) from Natwest.

So, my opinion. 'Basic' bank account al the way