Paying off interest free credit card

toothdoctor

Hi all


I have had an interest free Sainsbury credit card for the past 27 months and the interest free period is set to end on 2nd September. Over the months I have just been making the minimum payments (my direct debit is set to make minimum payments only) I have got the money to pay the balance off sitting in a savings account earning interest. I usually get my statement on the 5th of the month and make a payment usually around the 28th of the month. My question is do I have to pay the full amount off by 2nd of September to avoid paying interest or can I wait for my statement to generate on the 5th September and opt to pay the full amount by direct debit (which would come out on the 28th September) thus keeping the full balance in a savings account until the last minute earning interest. I have another credit card that I pay in full every month via direct debit and no interest is charged. I was just wondering if it would work in this case. Thanks

[Deleted User]

You need to clear it by 2nd September.

msallen

toothdoctor wrote: »

... the interest free period is set to end on 2nd September.

Answered your own question there!

surreysaver

You've probably left it too late to pay off without having to pay interest. Hopefully you won't wipe out all the interest you've earnt in your savings account!
You've got two working days to pay it off, so if you do it now you might be lucky

toothdoctor

Thanks for the replies. I thought it would be the 2nd, my initial doubt was the fact that normally if you pay your statement amount off in full then you wouldn't be charged any interest. So in my case the statement would come in on the 5th September and would be due for payment on the 28th. So my thought was if I paid it all off on the 28th then no interest would be charged. I will pay it off in time for the 2nd as it is not worth risking paying interest of about 20% for the sake of gaining interest of 1-2%
Thanks

toothdoctor

I thought paying by debit card was near instantaneous

Willing2Learn

toothdoctor wrote: »

I thought paying by debit card was near instantaneous

Paying by debit card is slow. In my experience it can take a couple of days to go through. On the other hand, a Faster Payment via online banking always gets cleared on my credit card account on the same working day.

surreysaver

toothdoctor wrote: »

Thanks for the replies. I thought it would be the 2nd, my initial doubt was the fact that normally if you pay your statement amount off in full then you wouldn't be charged any interest. So in my case the statement would come in on the 5th September and would be due for payment on the 28th. So my thought was if I paid it all off on the 28th then no interest would be charged. I will pay it off in time for the 2nd as it is not worth risking paying interest of about 20% for the sake of gaining interest of 1-2%
Thanks

It would have worked if you'd done it a month earlier i.e. your August 28th payment in full. That's what I normally do - make sure the payment due before the 0% expires is the one that pays off the card.

jimbo26

I have found that bank transfers are pretty much instant when paying off CC's. The balance shows the same until the next day, but the amount available goes up straight away.