Halifax clarity credit card

Kauto5

Hi all,
It'll be a while before we'll be allowed to travel abroad I'm sure, but I just have a question about you'd card which I'm looking to apply for before my next weekend in Europe:
I understand that purchases are interest free but cash withdrawals accrue interest. If I was to withdraw cash abroad and then immediately (well, on the same day) transferred that cash amount from my current account to the clarity card, would that avoid the interest?
Or would I have to wait a few days for the cash transaction to show up on the clarity card balance? Also, is there generally a monthly limit on the number of debit card payments you can make towards a credit card?
Thanks!

D3xt3r5L4b

It depends. Payments will go towards the highest interest bearing transaction.

And if the transaction doesn’t show up straight away you cannot make a payment to put the account in a positive balance. 

Life__Goes__On

I use to withdrawn Euros from a cash point, come back and make a payment to the card for the rough amount.
I never had trouble doing this and didn't have to wait till the amount showed.

Fingerbobs

I look at the "available credit" amount, which is updated immediately after the transaction, and make a payment to bring it back to the full credit limit. It's always worked for me.

SuperAllyB

Be aware that you have to clear the previous statement before you go, or any payments will go to statemented balances first.

Nebulous2

Getting hung up on avoiding interest isn’t necessarily productive. I’ve used Clarity extensively abroad for years, have often paid interest, but it has always been minimal. Generally less than £1. 

One way is to use Clarity for cash only, pay it off quickly and use another card for spending. Or use it for both spending and cash, pay off the full amount in the app, after it appears. My most recent trip I only withdrew cash once, my statement was 4 days later and I paid the balance immediately. I then only used it for spending and didn’t need cash again. 

Kauto5

Thanks everyone, sounds like as long as the balance for cash withdrawals is paid not too long after the transaction then interest will be minimal anyway. Let's hope we can travel again safely one day soon!

smithontour

SuperAllyB said:

Be aware that you have to clear the previous statement before you go, or any payments will go to statemented balances first.

Hi, I've only just come across this having used the Clarity card for a few years.  This seems to be a negative order of payment approach which I thought was banned.

In my case I had a March Statement bal of £234.42 due to be paid in full by direct debt on Apr 2nd.

On the 18 March I made a cash withdrawal of £263.63. Two days later I made a voluntary payment via bank transfer of £275 to cover the cash withdrawal. I expected to be charged two days worth of interest on the cash withdrawal (roughly 30p at 19.95% interest). I was actually charged £1.60.

Halifax's explanation: “Your statement of 6/3/20 had a balance of £234.42, so any payment you made was applied to this balance first, so the cash balance on your account was still outstanding until your direct debit lifted on 02/04/20”

The statement balance was not past due and therefore not attracting any interest, it was (and is always) set up to be paid by direct debit in full on the due date, so applying any voluntary payments to this first does not reduce an interest bearing liability. In short the way they have applied the payment has cost me more interest than if they had applied the voluntary payment to the cash withdrawal. While the amounts are small, the approach seems to follow a negative order of payment which i had assumed was banned since about 2010. 

SuperAllyB

Most (if not all) cards apply payments to statemented balances before non-statemented items.