New card - Abbey Zero

johnny_c-l

There's no fee with cash advances, but they do charge interest. ie withdraw £20 and pay £0 fee for doing so, but you are charged the % interest from the date you took it out.
HTH

jimbo26

Sounds like a clever marketing tool by Abbey to lure unsuspecting customers into withdrawing cash.

If you want a credit card for use abroad I recommend the Post Office credit card.

To withdraw cash use a Nationwide Flex Account or the Post Office Money Travel card which can be pre-loaded before your trip http://www.postoffice.co.uk/portal/po/jump1?catId=19300207&mediaId=26800661

[Deleted User]

Have I missed the point or is the 6 months fee-free balance transfer offer at 0% much more valuable than the 0% foreign currency?

eg spend £2,000 abroad, avoid fee of (say) 3% of 2k = £60. 6 months at 0% on (say) 5k versus (modest) 7.9% loan = £197.50 saved (ignoring time taken for transfers etc). Obviously less if you stooze into a savings account.

Isn't the Zero card worth it for that alone?

Any news on credit limits people have got versus other cards?

YorkshireBoy

anactuary wrote: »

Any news on credit limits people have got versus other cards?

Starting to filter through on the stoozing site...

http://www.stoozing.com/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1209198309/24#24

sandyback75

I was hoping to get an Abbey Zero card in the next two weeks for my hol. to America, went into the branch to apply to save time.

Their system refused me when they did a credit check, I showed her my bank statements and Post Office Credit Card acceptance letter I received two weeks ago to prove I have no problem with credit, she agreed there was no reason for it. Many calls later she got the system to refer to a manual check at head office as she said all applications had failed for days, she said she'd call me the next working day.

Guess what, no phone call, called their helpline as there is no branch phone number and I have been declined again. She said it's probably because I don't have any other Abbey accounts. I will need to reapply in 7-10 days, that's too late and probably won't work again, they seem to want me to open a current account to get accepted.

Poor service if you ask me.

dc

I have three Abbey cards, may swop to this
As to Nationwide without being a customer, would recommend going into a branch to apply for the debit card (Flex account), they should offer the cc with an instant credit check approval or not.


BEWARE

Abbey card cutomer services are virtually useless, they are new to the game (09/07) and in February had run out of printed Complaints Procedures leaflets and were issuing photocopies.
Computer systems "down" a lot.

I applied for ONE card to use as BT card, got three!! cards arrived 3weeks after BT was done, without telling me I had been approved.
First I knew was three letters arrived with different pins 10 days after applying.
Tried unsuccessfully to set up DD, got first month statement correctly then NO further statements in the following 3 months. Tried to set up online account immediately I realised I had got the BT. This was finally set up the day before the BT 0% ended!!! and shows all 3 cards, yet I was told on many occasions that it was NOT POSS to have more than ONE card.
To my surprise after all this is you cannot make an online payment, you can make payments at a branch but they cannot tell you what the balance of your account is!!!

Unless you want a frustrating adventure into the odd way the Spanish operate in Milton Keynes I would avoid.
Their cousins at Heathrow do a little bit better IMHO.

PS the BT was 0% for 6 months with £50 cashback, got the cheque very quickly, however they charged interest in the 5th month despite having said that this was not possible! and then when it was charged refunded it " As a Gesture of Goodwill" and not their mistake!!! :rolleyes2:rolleyes2:rolleyes2

mmr_2

Interesting point made above about instant interest payments concerning cash withdrawal. Being concerned about this I called up Abbey and they told me this was not the case, bear in mind this was regarding international withdrawals which are most likely processed differently than UK ones. Also bear in mind dc's post about Abbey's customer service. If anyone can throw some light on the matter would be great.

YorkshireBoy

mmr wrote: »

If anyone can throw some light on the matter would be great.

The T&C's throw all the light you need on the matter...

Cash advances:

Introductory/Promotional rate N/A. Monthly rate 1.9137%. Annual rate 25.9%

...and...

There is no interest free period on Cash Transactions

...and make no distinction between UK and overseas cash withdrawals.


http://www.abbey.com/csgs/Satellite?c=GSDetalleProducto&cid=1157698188950&idParent=1157698106817&pagename=Abbey%2FGSDetalleProducto%2FGS_DetProducto

mmr_2

Hm, so if one would want to withdraw cash, there would be no way of avoiding a fee ie. by instructing abbey to instantly debit your bank with the outstanding amount, is this correct? Another point could there be a possibility of only being charged on a set day of the month?

johnny_c-l

mmr wrote: »

Hm, so if one would want to withdraw cash, there would be no way of avoiding a fee ie. by instructing abbey to instantly debit your bank with the outstanding amount, is this correct? Another point could there be a possibility of only being charged on a set day of the month?

If you withdraw cash then you will be charged interest on that amount (at the cash advance rate), albeit without a fee.

I don't understand what you mean about being charged on one day of the month.

If you get a Nationwide Flex Current A/C, you can withdraw cash for free.