Credit Card for Spending Discussion Area

shizzlebizzle

Hi. After reading around and budgeting it out, I'm planning to apply for a ~12mth 0% card as a back-up to pay fees for the 1st year of a 3 year Masters degree (hoping to get career development loan for final 2 years). Tuition fees in the first year will be £2370 (spread through the year, paying per module) but as I'm working f/t alongside study I plan to borrow less than £1000 total on a card, if that - it's really to ease the pressure at crunch points in the year. I'd plan to clear or switch at the end of the 0%.

I'm assuming the current best deals (Tesco / M&S) will only be available to the best customers - healthy salaries, good credit activity (using but paying off credit, making the banks a bit of cash). I've checked my credit files, and there's nothing nasty on them (minor problems years ago seem to have cleared off); was a bit concerned about a 'rejection spiral' I got in last April / May when I tried to get a card from my bank to cover an emergency (probably rejected as p/t worker / new bank customer then), but that seems to have gone too. However, I'm worried about a couple of things before I apply:

I work f/t across 2 jobs (2 days + 3 days) - how does this look on credit card applications, and is there a good way to explain it? (Been with one employer 6 years, the other 15 months. The 6 year employer is a lower pro rata salary than the 15 month one, and is the '2 days' job - so what's more important - length of service? salary? whether it's the majority of the hours?).

My annual income is c.£22,000. This is not great, especially for London - but I manage, and have budgeted out my borrowing / repaying for the course. How will this affect the deals I can access?

After minor problems with debt 6+ years ago I've been mainly avoiding it since - the only thing I have now is a phone contract which is always paid on time by DD, and an automatic £200 o/d on my bank account, which I dip in and out of. I took a 12 month interest-free Hitachi credit agreement to buy something for £120 (!) 2-3 years ago with no problems - all paid off ok. But am still nervous, especially after being rejected for crappy cards last year. My credit file looks very clean now - perhaps too clean though??

So - any help with: explaining my work situation on the application / advice on what to expect or apply for on a £22k salary (length of 0%, £1k limit?)/ should I pre-empt a rejection by building my credit activity (getting a high rate card & paying off minor spend every month)? Have considered ringing card companies to ask for some 'ideal customer' profiling info - but suspect it may be a waste of time!

Sorry.. long post! Any help welcome - thanks for reading.

bigup7

my current 12 month 0% Tesco Credit card is coming to end now, i have about £100 left to pay off

once balance has been paid off, can i cancel card and reapply with tesco to get their new 15month 0% card?

Any

bigup7 wrote: »

my current 12 month 0% Tesco Credit card is coming to end now, i have about £100 left to pay off

once balance has been paid off, can i cancel card and reapply with tesco to get their new 15month 0% card?

You can. Most cards have 12 mths period of closure before you are considered new customer again... Not sure Tesco has 6 or 12 mths..

zoebel

I have a credit card with Tesco, taken out in June 2011. I am nearly maxed out on it and would like to apply for the M&S credit card. I don't think I would get rejected but am concerned that, due to only having recently applied for another credit card within 3 months and being nearly maxed out, if I apply too soon it will look bad and I may only get a rubbish credit limit. Any advice would be gratefully received.

aimsbristol

I wonder if someone could help me please. I need to pay a large bill and I have a 0% purchase credit card. I cant pay this bill by card as they dont have a card machine but wondered if taking money out at the cash point counted as a purchase???

Nazitf

Is the Barclaycard Platinum CC still giving £30 cashback? Can't see this anywhere on their website.

barrett8302

Hello
Could someone please give me some advice?
I have had the tesco 0% on purchases deal before but paid it off and cancelled the card over a year ago. Is that long enough to wait to re-apply and be treated as a new customer? Or will I never be able to get the deal again?
Thanks very much
Chris

sbutton

Hi,

I currently have around 35,000 on credit cards not to mention several loans, for various reasons that I won't go into. It sounds a lot, but I (usually) earn over 3 times this as an IT contractor so it's kind of manageable.... or perhaps not as bad as it sounds?

Anyway, I have managed to get this amount down over the last year or so... but only very slowly. I'd like to speed this up, and the plan is to move all of it gradually onto 0% cards, by paying off the same amount that the new cards accumulate to pay off the old cards.

Does this sound achievable over a couple of years? Is there a site which tells me which cards belong to which company? I currently have Barclaycard(s), Halifax, Virgin, Capital One and Tesco. The Tesco is at 0% and I've started shifting onto that one, but once that fills up I'll need to look somewhere else. (M&S, NatWest, RBS, ...) and of course cancel the existing cards.

I know this is going to be hard work, and I'll need to be very organised, but it's the only remaining way I can think of shaving anything more off our monthly budget.

I've set up a spreadsheet for all the cards, and I will set up reminders in Google calender for when the 0% is about to run out.

Any generic advice for how to make this work?

Thanks,

LOOBAH

Hi all,

I am currently an apprentice and will be becoming fully employed at new year, my wage is set to increase substantially - does this make me more likely to be accepted for a credit card?

I have applied for a credit card this year (Natwest, I think) and I was rejected. I don't have a bad credit rating as I have never been in debt or anything like that.

So, yeah, would earning more than double the amount of money I'm on now mean I'm more likely to be accepted for a 0% spending credit card?

Thanks,

Louise

sbutton

LOOBAH wrote: »

Hi all,

I am currently an apprentice and will be becoming fully employed at new year, my wage is set to increase substantially - does this make me more likely to be accepted for a credit card?

Louise

Hi, I think you might be asking in the wrong place. This "thread" has been dead for a while, and no replies to my question from months ago. Perhaps you'd be better off starting a new thread?

I get the feeling that it's hard to get credit, if you haven't already got any credit. Perhaps you'd be better off applying for a standard rate card first, and then put some spending onto that (making sure you pay it off in full each month!). Just don't get into the habit of spending more than you would normally, just use it for shopping or whatever. Easier said than done perhaps.

Store cards and other agreements all help as well.

You can check your credit record with Experian or Equifax for free, so that's worth doing... although be careful as they will try to sell you a regular credit check or credit alerts, etc.

Hope this helps,