Another credit card??

doublemm

Hi All,

Need some of your advise. WE have a credit card with £2k on it. And unfortunately no promotional rate on it. We pay high interest. Of course I am planing to pay this off asap, but was thinking to apply for another credit card with promotional interest.
I am scarred this will damage very serious our credit score.. WE only have this balance to pay. I have another CC but I pay every month in full.
Can you advise is it worth it to apply for anther cc and transfer balance? are there any cards on the market that have option to transfer balance and have promotional rate? Will this damage very serious our credit score?
Thanks for all your replays

Willing2Learn

Yes, it is worthwhile doing a balance transfer to a card that is running a 0% promotion. See the link below for more information:
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/credit-cards/balance-transfer-credit-cards/

There is a section within that article with a list of cards that are at 0%. For some reason, Tesco is missing, but you can visit their website for info on their 0% promotional offers.

[Deleted User]

Ignore your score - it's made up and no one sees it

Eternal1

!!! wrote: »

Ignore your score - it's made up and no one sees it

Sorry to piggy back on the OPs thread but since it seems to be well established around here that your credit SCORE is meaningless, how do you know how likely you are to be accepted for a card or not?

For example say you have 6 months of perfect credit history, how do I know if a credit card company will value this as excellent, good or maybe even poor? Getting rejected for credit cards or getting hard searches on your history affect your credit negatively so I'd like to avoid that if possible.

Willing2Learn

Eternal1 wrote: »

For example say you have 6 months of perfect credit history, how do I know if a credit card company will value this as excellent, good or maybe even poor? Getting rejected for credit cards or getting hard searches on your history affect your credit negatively so I'd like to avoid that if possible.

Six years of a perfect credit file history is even better. Lenders only see the history of your credit account management, electoral roll information plus other relevant data. They do not see your credit score. They score using the data in your file added to the data in a credit account application against their own independent criteria and policies.

PRAISETHESUN

Paying 0% (or low %) on a £2k balance compared to 20%+ on the same balance is a no brainer. Even with a 3-5% BT fee I would daresay you are much better off on a 0% card than paying such a high rate of interest on such a large balance.

I wouldn't be worried about applying for another card, as from what you say you only have this card - a single application every now and then will not affect your credit history. Note that your credit SCORE as provided by the CRAs is basically meaningless and nothing to worry about - every lender generates their own internal score to use on applications based upon the contents of your credit file, so what matters most is your credit HISTORY.

Use an eligibility checker to search for which balance transfer cards you might be eligible for, keeping an eye on both the balance transfer fee and the interest rate of transferred funds. These will make only a soft "quotation" search, which will not be visible to lenders. Once you find one with a decent chance of success, then you should make your application. Be aware not to make more applications one after the other if you are rejected, as this can spiral out of control and ruin your credit history for years.

Eternal1

Willing2Learn wrote: »

Six years of a perfect credit file history is even better. Lenders only see the history of your credit account management, electoral roll information plus other relevant data. They do not see your credit score. They score using the data in your file added to the data in a credit account application against their own independent criteria and policies.

6 years is a long time to use a credit builder card though... At some point I'd like to move up and apply for one of the better cards with some rewards or whatever. I'm thinking after 6 months of using my credit builder card, I could try applying for one of the next level cards but again I have no idea if I will be accepted and if I get rejected this will make it harder to get approved by a different credit issuer.

PRAISETHESUN

Eternal1 wrote: »

Sorry to piggy back on the OPs thread but since it seems to be well established around here that your credit SCORE is meaningless, how do you know how likely you are to be accepted for a card or not?

For example say you have 6 months of perfect credit history, how do I know if a credit card company will value this as excellent, good or maybe even poor? Getting rejected for credit cards or getting hard searches on your history affect your credit negatively so I'd like to avoid that if possible.

As every lender uses their own scoring system, it is hard to tell which factors a potential lender might like. Most major CC companies have eligibility checkers, which you can use to gauge your chances of success without having to make a full "hard" application.

[Deleted User]

PRAISETHESUN wrote: »

As every lender uses their own scoring system, it is hard to tell which factors a potential lender might like. Most major CC companies have eligibility checkers, which you can use to gauge your chances of success without having to make a full "hard" application.

No one will know it's a credit builder or sub-prime card other than you

If you get a Barclaycard Initial they used to bump them up to the Platinum cards after 12 months of paying on time etc. - not sure if they still do that.

Always use an eligibility checker first to scope out your potential acceptances

doublemm

Thanks All, Checked the Eligibility Calculator and have some options. Top four are Barclaycard Platinum, with a different promotional period and BT fees from 1.99 to 0% (of course on the shortest period).
So My question is..if we go for the card that looks like offers the longest free period (and a fee of 1.99%BT) how does the balance transfer work? How we arrange this? Can this be rejected to do it? And if say, we want to purchase something with this (new) credit card, this purchase pay off will be still eligible for promotional period (of course depends when the period ends) or this is only promotional period to pay off balance transfer?

Willing2Learn

I would take the card with the best promotion. 0% BT and 0% BT fee would be the best.

Your chosen card will likely have either a purchases promotion or a BT promotion. They don't often have the two (except the all-rounder cards)

I wouldn't mix purchases with a BT as it gets confusing and the interest will be high.