Yo-Yo balance transfer

surreysaver

I've got about £4k at 0% ending 31st January. This card also has about £2k available credit with a 0% offer.
I also have another card offering a fee-free balance transfer at 9.9% APR.
I was thinking of transferring the £4k to the 9.9% card, then once the transaction has cleared transferring it back.
I reckon this would cost a couple of quid as the balance would be charged at 9.9% for a couple of days. 
Has anyone used this method to bounce balances around before?

paradigital

I have done similar before.  I got a very good 0% deal length and credit limit on a new Halifax card, but the balance I wanted to shift was on my existing Halifax card.

I just shifted the balance to one of my other cards at it’s typical rate for a week, then transferred to the new Halifax card.  

As you say, it’s not optimal from a fee and interest rate point of view, but for me at least it was a guaranteed way of ensuring that the 0% card I could get was going to have a sizable limit.

Emily_Joy

surreysaver said:

I've got about £4k at 0% ending 31st January. This card also has about £2k available credit with a 0% offer.
I also have another card offering a fee-free balance transfer at 9.9% APR.
I was thinking of transferring the £4k to the 9.9% card, then once the transaction has cleared transferring it back.
I reckon this would cost a couple of quid as the balance would be charged at 9.9% for a couple of days. 
Has anyone used this method to bounce balances around before?

Are you sure that the current 0% offer stays past 31st of January? 

surreysaver

Emily_Joy said:

surreysaver said:

I've got about £4k at 0% ending 31st January. This card also has about £2k available credit with a 0% offer.
I also have another card offering a fee-free balance transfer at 9.9% APR.
I was thinking of transferring the £4k to the 9.9% card, then once the transaction has cleared transferring it back.
I reckon this would cost a couple of quid as the balance would be charged at 9.9% for a couple of days. 
Has anyone used this method to bounce balances around before?

Are you sure that the current 0% offer stays past 31st of January? 

The existing balance 0% expires on 31st January.
The offer of a 0% balance transfer expires on 4th February.
I will need to pay off the existing balance regardless, whether it is actually paid off, or via balance transfer.  If I pay off the balance via balance transfer, then I can just balance transfer back for another year at 0% (although a 3% fee applies for that, there is no fee for the first balance transfer, although there is an APR of 9% which will cost me about £3 if the balance is in the yo-yo for a couple of days).
I think the key to it is timing to minimise the time I'm paying 9.9%, which probably means doing the first transfer on Monday to avoid any non-working days being involved. Then just keeping an eye to see when the available balance increases so I can do the second transfer as soon as possible.

Brie

Sorry but I'm missing something here.  Why would you transfer money (with a fee of what? 3%?) and then transfer it back (with another fee of what? 3%???) Why incur 6% fees in just one month?

Altior

Brie said:

Sorry but I'm missing something here.  Why would you transfer money (with a fee of what? 3%?) and then transfer it back (with another fee of what? 3%???) Why incur 6% fees in just one month?

The 9.9% BT is fee free. It works as effectively just using the BT offer for the OB on the existing card/balance. Just in this case it needs to be cycled via the other lender (couple of quid cost) as obviously you can't BT to the same card (or lender group). 

I've done this more than once. There's no issue, I would advise the OP to double check the offers are available in their actual accounts (not just been messaged about them). As I have experienced the deals not being available, and being pulled before the closing date.

surreysaver

Brie said:

Sorry but I'm missing something here.  Why would you transfer money (with a fee of what? 3%?) and then transfer it back (with another fee of what? 3%???) Why incur 6% fees in just one month?

Just one lot of fees. To borrow £4k for another year at 0%.

surreysaver

Altior said:

Brie said:

Sorry but I'm missing something here.  Why would you transfer money (with a fee of what? 3%?) and then transfer it back (with another fee of what? 3%???) Why incur 6% fees in just one month?

I've done this more than once. There's no issue, I would advise the OP to double check the offers are available in their actual accounts (not just been messaged about them). As I have experienced the deals not being available, and being pulled before the closing date.

Yes, I've noticed cards doing that before!

Nasqueron

Brie said:

Sorry but I'm missing something here.  Why would you transfer money (with a fee of what? 3%?) and then transfer it back (with another fee of what? 3%???) Why incur 6% fees in just one month?

Halifax used to do offers like this for me - fee free transfer with a fixed APR (5.9% iirc) for the life of the balance or a 0% transfer with a fixed fee (5% usually, they weren't great so I don't use them)

surreysaver

Well, I've done my balance transfers. I've had a statement off the 9.9% card, and they haven't charged me any interest (even though the £4k was officially on it for a day).
Whether they'll charge me a day's interest at a future date or not I'll have to wait and see