Cash for Interest Free Credit

Dr_Beancounter

Looking at buying a new kitchen. The Vendor offers 5 years interest free credit with the same cash price. Clearly, the cost is way below what they are advertising and they add in the finance charges to make up the cash number. Has anyone had any success in negotiating a win/win? They get cash up front and make more on the kitchen (no finance required) but you pay less.

CliveOfIndia

There's no harm in asking.  But very often you'll find that the finance is provided by a third party, not the supplier themselves, so you'll often find there's nothing for them to gain by offering a discount for cash.

Yes, of course there's no such thing as free credit, and someone is paying for it somewhere along the line.  But the way such businesses work can often be less than intuitive.

Probably the simplest option for you would be to take up the offer of free credit then stick the appropriate amount into a savings account.  If you can get a better rate by using a notice account then even better - you'll know exactly when you'll need the money, so it's easy enough to give the required amount of notice.

At least that way you'll earn yourself a bit of interest on the money, which is better than nothing.