Tesco credit card balance transfer, what are the chances of them saying 'yes'?

CakeCrusader

Hiya.

I've got a pretty poor credit rating and I'm waiting for a couple of paid CCJ's to fall off, one should go this year, one next year (both were for water (£189 and £320) after I lost my job but have been paid in full), and there's 2 late payments for O2 which are 3.5 years old. Other than this, I've kept up with everything. My credit file was pretty awful and I had to get a Vanquis card, which is supposed to be for emergencies but it has a balance of £2k (they are increasing it again in Feb but I don't use it now, I'm just paying it off). I'm paying more than the minimum, but I haven't been able to clear it fully. I've never missed a payment or gone over my limit, and I keep increasing my payments but it makes a dent in the outstanding balance so I don't feel as though I'm getting anywhere.

I looked online last night, and I've spotted a 0% interest (2 years) on balance transfers for 2 years (Tesco credit card), and I thought rather than pay a load of interest every month I could transfer the balance, carry on paying the amount I am paying to Vanquis, and clear it off faster. I completed the online form, and they said I'd be allowed a credit limit of £1,900, and a transfer limit of £1,800 (almost my balance of Vanquis), but they need to run more checks and they will let me know within 5 days. It would be a massive help if I could transfer the balance, but I'm not sure if it's likely considering my credit history. I work full time (I earn about 29.5K before tax, NI, student loan and pension), I've been living in my current rented home for almost 4 years, I'm on the electoral roll, I have no outstanding debt (other that my student loan). I'm not sure what my chances are or whether to try another credit card company if Tesco say 'no' as I'm wary of the footprint on my credit file. I can try to pay it off faster by looking at my outgoings, but the interest is massive! Are Tesco pretty accommodating??

I'm sorry if I'm being dumb, my parents relied on provident loan and benefits so I'm trying to work my way around things.

Many thanks :beer:

quackers82

Have you joined the money saving expert credit club? http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/creditclub

Its not a guarantee , but a good indication. Tesco had me down as 90% chance of the transfer card via that and accepted me.

CakeCrusader

quackers82 wrote: »

Have you joined the money saving expert credit club? http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/creditclub

Its not a guarantee , but a good indication. Tesco had me down as 90% chance of the transfer card via that and accepted me.

Ahh, thanks I'll check that out later. Noodle said I had a good chance, Tesco said it wasn't that good so I'm not too sure if they will approve it (they didn't say no right away though):(

CakeCrusader

Thank you

Tesco was 40% (ouch, I wish I'd have found this last night!) but HSBC was 80%. I'll wait for Tesco to tell me to go away and try HSBC.

CakeCrusader

They called my mobile (I googled the number) but they hung up a couple of seconds after I picked up and said 'hello', without saying anything. I haven't received an email acknowledging my application either. It's not looking good, is it!

CakeCrusader

I received a letter this morning asking me to call them, so I did. They confirmed my details and said I'd been accepted! They are sending me out a welcome pack and they are going to transfer most of the outstanding balance on the Vanquis card (I've already cleared the rest). It's such a relief to go from a card charging you 69.9% interest to one which is 0, I can get this cleared off so much quicker. I'm just letting people know that they can do this and they don't have to put up with paying so much interest, just look around

jamesperrett

One thing to watch with Tesco is, if you want to pay by direct debit, you need to set one up straight away before your first statement comes through. I've just been caught out as I hadn't realised that, if there is no direct debit set up when they create your statement, they won't use the direct debit you subsequently set up - even if it is in place when your payment is due. Other credit card companies make the direct debit process more obvious.

CakeCrusader

jamesperrett wrote: »

One thing to watch with Tesco is, if you want to pay by direct debit, you need to set one up straight away before your first statement comes through. I've just been caught out as I hadn't realised that, if there is no direct debit set up when they create your statement, they won't use the direct debit you subsequently set up - even if it is in place when your payment is due. Other credit card companies make the direct debit process more obvious.

Ahh, this is really useful to know, thank you! I'll wait for them to send the stuff through and sort this out ASAP.

eskbanker

jamesperrett wrote: »

One thing to watch with Tesco is, if you want to pay by direct debit, you need to set one up straight away before your first statement comes through. I've just been caught out as I hadn't realised that, if there is no direct debit set up when they create your statement, they won't use the direct debit you subsequently set up - even if it is in place when your payment is due. Other credit card companies make the direct debit process more obvious.

I'm not convinced this is a Tesco-specific issue, the general advice on here has always been not to assume that a bill will be settled by DD unless or until the statement explicitly says it will be.

Gouki7851

In my opinion Tesco is rubbish, offered 0% for 24 months with no fee but charged nearly 4% when accepted and transfered. Stick with HSBC or barclaycard, so much better and in my experience much higher limits Tesco 1k HSBC 6k, have credit card history with barclaycard but 11.5k limit. HSBC and barclaycard offered what was stated, Tesco didn't. If you have 80% chance of HSBC acceptance i would go for it and also try barclaycards own eligibility checker to see what they say.

CakeCrusader

Thank you, Gouki.

Tesco have 3 different types of balance transfer. There's one which is 0% for 24 months, one which is 0% for 24 months but has a 3.94% money transfer fee, and one which has a "0% interest on balance transfers and money transfers for the first 24 months. This offer is applied to any transfers made within the first 90 days of account opening, if you make your minimum repayments on time and in full." ( I think I'd get told off if I linked it here). Did you call them to check that you had the right one?