MSE Club Eligibility Vs Lender Eligibility?

RachS87

Hi, apologies if this has already been asked / answered somewhere, I did a search but couldn't find anything related.

So I'm looking to take out a loan to consolidate credit card debts into one payment and reduce the amount of interest I'm paying. The 0% cards on offer to me at the moment are only short term (6 - 9 months) and I would prefer it was over 2-3 years as it's for about 12k. In my MSE Credit Club account, the loan eligibility calculator says I am 80% likely to be accepted for a couple of loans, but when I go directly to those lenders and check my eligibility, it tells me I will not be accepted. So, how accurate is the MSECC calculation? I'd assume it's more accurate as it has more information about my credit history than the soft checks on a lenders eligibility checker? I have a good (not excellent) credit rating, no missed payments CCJ's etc, never been refused credit before. I don't want to chance applying for them and being refused and having a mark on my credit report.

Thanks for reading, I appreciate any advice / guidance you can give.

Ebe_Scrooge

Any eligibility calculator is at best a rough guide.  Arguably a lender's own calculator should be slightly more accurate as they know what their own particular criteria are.  But ultimately you won't know for sure until you submit an application and they do a hard search.  And one hard search on your record is neither here nor there.

That aside, consolidation is rarely a good idea.  Firstly, unless you can address the underlying cause of the debt then you're just saving up further headaches for yourself.  Secondly, a lender cannot guarantee that you'll use the loan to repay the credit cards.  So they have to take the view that any loan will be in addition to, not instead of, your existing debt.  Which may well mean that you fail their affordability checks.

If you can shift any part of the debt to a 0% card then that's a start - although you must make sure you'll be able to repay the BT before the promotional rate expires.  But by far the better long-term approach is to head on over to the Debt-Free Wannabe board, post an SOA and let the friendly folk there give you advice on how to tackle the debt.