Mule Card Query

jitasb

Hello.

I have been reading this excellent site with interest. And wonder if someone can answer a couple of questions:

1. Is Egg the only mule card which we can use at the moment ?

2. Could you use Virgin Money as a mule card, or is it because it charges a fee to xfer money to your bank a/c that it's not worth it ?

Many thanks.

YorkshireBoy

jitasb wrote: »

1. Is Egg the only mule card which we can use at the moment ?

It's not the only mule card, but it's certainly the easiest to use and quite possibly the cheapest.

2. Could you use Virgin Money as a mule card, or is it because it charges a fee to xfer money to your bank a/c that it's not worth it ?

Exactly right...the fee is certainly a constraint.

jitasb

Thanks YorkshireBoy.

Just looking around I see that the MBNA Platinum Plus is doing 0% BT and also 0% cash xfer to your bank a/c , both for 0% until May 2009.

This seems like agood deal for either a BT card or as a Mule card ?

YorkshireBoy

jitasb wrote: »

This seems like agood deal for either a BT card or as a Mule card ?

A mule card 'carries', or 'routes', cash from another BT card to your current account.

As such, you'll pay a 2.9%(ish) fee for every muling operation you make, meaning unless the 0% BT 'donor' card is fee-free each operation will cost you around 5-6%, which will almost certainly make you a loss.

The MBNA cards are a good 'one-shot' stooz card, but you need a fee-free mule card such as Egg Money to enjoy profitable stoozing.

YorkshireBoy

jitasb wrote: »

3. The MBNA Platinum plus is now in Credit and I withdraw this money to my bank a/c for 0% fee.

Always a gamble IMO.

There are people who will tell you they do this, and have done it regularly over the years. However, it's not a 'usual' credit card transaction and the more you attempt it the more chance you have of having your account flagged up for 'unusual activity' (investigated by the bank's AML team).

I can load up my Egg Money card to a penny shy of £100K (and have done, to the tune of £40K before now )...you try loading up an MBNA card to the same level and see what happens!!!

Finally, there's always the chance that MBNA will refuse to send the money to your current account, and send it back to the BT card instead. If they do this, and you've paid a 3% BT fee, then you've lost money (£300 on a £10K BT).