When to apply for new CC after paying off old one?

Ostrich_Emerges

Hi

I've just paid off one CC balance (just before 0% rate went up to 19%), but I still owe £6K on another high-interest card. I'd like to move to another 0% deal, but won't be able to clear £6K in a year/15 months, so I'd move part of debt to life-of-balance deal and part to a new card at 0%. The a/c I've just paid - but not closed - can do 7.9% on l-o-b, but only after a/c has been open 1 year (end of May). I'm assuming it is better to use existing a/c if poss, to avoid having too many credit checks on file.

My questions are:

1. How long does it take for my settlement to show up on my credit file?
2. Should I wait for this before applying for new card (for 0% deal) or apply now?

Thanks for reading this - hope you can help.

GeorgeUK

Check your credit report free at experian (if you cancel within 30 days) and check how many credit checks you've had in the last 6 months. You can usually have 3 in that time period before your credit score is affected, but it is better to space out the applications.

I would stick to the 0% transfers myself as you can just apply for another 0% deal when the next one is running out rather than pay interest. If you request a 2nd card you may not get as high a credit limit as you did on the first, but if you don't have that many credit checks on your report, it may be worthwhile.

Just make sure that you can do the trasnfer and are not using 2 cards that have the same card provider.