Quite urgent - need pre paid credit card for holiday car rental

Horracce

Hi all. In 18 days I’m in Spain for a holiday and have rented a car at the airport. Just found out I need to present a CC in my name with a balance of at least £4k. I don’t have a CC at the moment.. and I thought perhaps one of 2 strategies .. please help / advise  
 
strategy 1 is to apply for basic CC from my bank (monzo or Barclays) and get the 1200 balance or thereabouts.. then deposit 3000 into it thus creating the capacity for a 4000 test / swipe 
 
stragegy 2 is to get a pre paid card and add a suitable balance .. would need a quality / trustable provider for this 
 
Thanks

born_again

Horracce said:

Hi all. In 18 days I’m in Spain for a holiday and have rented a car at the airport. Just found out I need to present a CC in my name with a balance of at least £4k. I don’t have a CC at the moment.. and I thought perhaps one of 2 strategies .. please help / advise  
 
strategy 1 is to apply for basic CC from my bank (monzo or Barclays) and get the 1200 balance or thereabouts.. then deposit 3000 into it thus creating the capacity for a 4000 test / swipe 
 
stragegy 2 is to get a pre paid card and add a suitable balance .. would need a quality / trustable provider for this 
 
Thanks

1. You can not put a CC in a credit balance. Against T/C

2. You would need to ensure that any pre-paid card is actually a Credit Card & Hire co would accept the card. Many will not take pre-paid cards as it removes their ability to claim further funds.

eskbanker

Horracce said:

Hi all. In 18 days I’m in Spain for a holiday and have rented a car at the airport. Just found out I need to present a CC in my name with a balance of at least £4k. I don’t have a CC at the moment.. and I thought perhaps one of 2 strategies .. please help / advise  
 
strategy 1 is to apply for basic CC from my bank (monzo or Barclays) and get the 1200 balance or thereabouts.. then deposit 3000 into it thus creating the capacity for a 4000 test / swipe 
 
stragegy 2 is to get a pre paid card and add a suitable balance .. would need a quality / trustable provider for this

Option 1 is unlikely to be viable, as preloading credit cards is generally against the Ts & Cs.  Note also that £1200 credit limit is a standardised representative figure and may not resemble what you'd be offered.

Option 2 is also likely to be an issue, as not many car hire companies will accept prepaid cards (which aren't credit cards as there's no credit provision).

Best bet is to check with the hire company which cards they'll accept, and if it has to be a credit card then use eligibility checkers to try to ascertain your prospects for a new credit cards.  Or find another hire company with a lower deposit requirement....

CliveOfIndia

As others have said, you can't pre-load a credit card.  I suspect what they actually meant was "an available credit limit" of £4000, rather than a "balance" of £4000.  That being the case then any standard credit card would do the trick - the only sticking point being whether you'd get a £4000 limit right from the start.

Horracce said:

 
strategy 1 is to apply for basic CC from my bank (monzo or Barclays) and get the 1200 balance or thereabouts.. 

The figure of £1200 is the representative figure that all lenders have to use in their marketing - to allow consumers to compare like with like.  The limit you personally will be offered will depend on your income, existing debt, credit history, and the lender's own internal acceptance criteria.

Nasqueron

Use an eligibility checker to see what card you could get and what the likely limit is going to be (bank soft checkers sometimes do this). There was a post a while back with one of the comparison sites, can't remember which, that gave an accurate balance prediction but it does depend on credit history and salary etc. no guarantees you will get the limit you want

flaneurs_lobster

If you bank with Barclays would it be worth a branch visit to check if they can give you the heads-up on what your likely credit limit might be (and maybe expedite the application)?

An aside, there have been reports of some car hire companies in Europe (not the major chains but maybe those booked through third parties (Direct Rent/Goldstar/Delpaso have been mentioned) only accepting embossed cards. Pretty much a scam to force you to use their expensive indemnity insurance but it's worth a check in the teeny-tiny print.

Nasqueron

flaneurs_lobster said:

If you bank with Barclays would it be worth a branch visit to check if they can give you the heads-up on what your likely credit limit might be (and maybe expedite the application)?

An aside, there have been reports of some car hire companies in Europe (not the major chains but maybe those booked through third parties (Direct Rent/Goldstar/Delpaso have been mentioned) only accepting embossed cards. Pretty much a scam to force you to use their expensive indemnity insurance but it's worth a check in the teeny-tiny print.

Branch visit won't do that - staff there will neither be able to give OP any idea of limit nor speed up the application - they will just say to go online

flaneurs_lobster

Nasqueron said:

Branch visit won't do that - staff there will neither be able to give OP any idea of limit nor speed up the application - they will just say to go online

Fair enough, anyone would think that these branch things were a waste of time and would be better off being shut down....

diveunderthebonnet

flaneurs_lobster said:

Nasqueron said:

Branch visit won't do that - staff there will neither be able to give OP any idea of limit nor speed up the application - they will just say to go online

Fair enough, anyone would think that these branch things were a waste of time and would be better off being shut down....

They are and before long it will be a struggle to find an actual branch outside of major towns and city,s 

lr1277

This is not a recommendation as I don’t have this card.
The Yonder credit card allows you to top up to increase your credit limit as you describe.There is a free version and a paid version. One or both of them has fee free fx transactions. If you do top it up but don’t use that money I don’t know how you get the top up back or if you have to keep spending on the card till you use the top up.
It is a rewards credit card but I understand the rewards are London-centric. I have seen a little negative sentiment towards the card but cannot remember the nature of that sentiment.
Use at your own risk.
2nd edit: if memory serves, I think they want read only access to your current account. I don’t know if that is still the case. They said this helps them determine your credit limit.
Hope that helps.

Edited to add: Pre-covid Amex were known to give good limits but I don’t know if that is still the case. One disadvantage of Amex is every UK card charges an fx fee. But if you get a good limit (depending on your salary, current state of your credit file etc), then you won’t need to add money to sort of increase your credit limit.
As you might be aware, if the 1st or 2nd card don’t give you what you want in the card, continuing to apply for cards may impair your credit file which will make getting credit in the future much harder. I think I have seen one person on the boards apply for a number of cards in minutes as the credit file shouldn’t update that quickly. It may have trashed their credit file but they got what they wanted. You use this strategy at your own risk.

flaneurs_lobster

lr1277 said:

This is not a recommendation as I don’t have this card.
The Yonder credit card allows you to top up the balance as you describe.There is a free version and a paid version. One or both of them has fee free fx transactions. If you do top it up but don’t use that money I don’t know how you get the top up back or if you have to keep spending on the card till you use the top up.
It is a rewards credit card but I understand the rewards are London-centric. I have seen a little negative sentiment towards the card but cannot remember the nature of that sentiment.
Use at your own risk.
Hope that helps.

Don't think so. The Yonder credit card is a credit card like any other credit card.

There are Yonder debit cards that you do top up but them's not credit cards.

https://www.yonder.com/