Advice on consolidating debt?

samclarke669

EssexHebridean wrote: »

Sign yourself up to the MSE Credit Club - that will enable you to see what deals you might be eligible for as the end of the 0% deals approaches.

Thanks! Would that be in the Credit Card Eligibility section?

EssexHebridean

It has its own website MSE Credit Club

samclarke669

EssexHebridean wrote: »

It has its own website MSE Credit Club

Yep, i'm already on that to check my credit score :j i just wondered if the header Credit Card Eligibility was the right tab relating to what you were talking about

Willing2Learn

Lenders don't use your 'credit score' and they don't see it either.

When you logon to MSE Credit Club, ignore the score. Just use the Credit Club to confirm the accuracy of data held on your Experian credit report, and also for the eligibility checker.

samclarke669

Good to know. thankyou!

enthusiasticsaver

What advantage is there in having all of your credit on one card especially if it is almost £12k? Long deals are not that easy to get hold of and you may not get a deal with that high a balance.

I think you are right to chip away at the cards which have 6 months to a year left although moving the store cards is helpful if you are paying interest.

samclarke669

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

What advantage is there in having all of your credit on one card especially if it is almost £12k? Long deals are not that easy to get hold of and you may not get a deal with that high a balance.

I think you are right to chip away at the cards which have 6 months to a year left although moving the store cards is helpful if you are paying interest.

To be honest, it was so everything could be in one place..there wasn't really a rhyme or reason behind it, i just thought it might be easier for my digest/get my head around

enthusiasticsaver

samclarke669 wrote: »

To be honest, it was so everything could be in one place..there wasn't really a rhyme or reason behind it, i just thought it might be easier for my digest/get my head around

The thing is though the amount would then be so high that it would be daunting to tackle and feel like a massive mountain to climb. Primarily you need to sort out your budget, stop spending on credit and make a plan to repay. Moving debt around does not really help in reducing it beyond saving interest and your cards are already 0%. There would be balance transfer fees to move it on to other cards(probably quite high as the balances are large) so that is dead money. Are you paying more than minimums?

samclarke669

I am now. I've been paying minimum up until this point, though

EssexHebridean

For anyone else reading this who is paying down debts on CC's - an easy way of paying off a little more on cards where you would otherwise just be paying the minimum is to set the Direct Debit to a little above where the minimum payment sits currently. So if you have a minimum payment of £83.27 this month, perhaps you might set the DD to £85. Then just leave it there and let it pay out each month. rather than your payments falling over time - and so having less impact, they stay at the current level, meaning they have more impact on the outstanding balance on the card. the secondary advantage of this is that normally the payment falls each month, meaning that over time you add to the surplus in your bank account each month but without noticing you're doing it - and "money you didn't know you had" is all the more likely to get frittered away. If you can afford £85 payment to that card this month, then it will likely be all the same to you to afford that same amount next month too.

Debt clearance by stealth methods - who wouldn't enjoy that?!