MarkO

Bear in mind that if you have a 0% balance transfer rate with, say, a 9% purchases rate, that as you pay off the card they'll pay off the balance transfer first. So, for example, with a new card:

Balance transfer of £1,000.00 in month 1.
Purchase of £500.00 in month 2.
Payment of £500.00 at end of month 2.

This would leave you with £500 of the balance transfer, and £500 of the purchases on the card. The latter of which would - of course - accrue interest. So basically, if you transfer a balance onto the card and make any purchases, you'll end up paying interest even if you pay off the cost of the purchases every month.

So perhaps you're actually paying interest on part of the balance you thought you weren't?

Most people assume that the balance transfer will remain uncharged as long as they pay off the cost of any purchases immediately. That's how the clever b*stards make their money.


[Edited by MarkO - 10/9/2002 9:54:03 AM]

dsmith

Have an Egg card which normamly gets paid off pretty much every month. Occasionally get a few quid interest but not enough to "notice".

This month due to a shed load of business expenses taking ages to come through I had a larger balance which led to a big enough interst payment for it to notice and me to investigate.

As far as I can see - I get charged interest on Opening Balance + Pucrhases on a daily basis throughout month. Payments areen't taken account off until end of the months :angry:

So with an opening balance of £3k at beg of month, and a £1k payment the next day, thats not counted until end of the month ? Meaning I pay an extra £13 interest (total of £38) - whilst Egg have my £1k. Now I'm not stupid but I still cant get my figures to match exactly theirs.

Bloody money for old rope. B*stard money grabbing financial institutions.

Deano

dsmith

No balance transfers involved. No cash advances involved. Straight purchases and I still cant get the interest figure to match exactly.

MarkO

They're clearly just tossers then.

You've taken into account compound interest and so on?

dsmith

yes

MattN

remember if you don't clear the balance the interest is calculated from the day you made the purchase. Then the oldest purchases are cleared with your 1k.

so if you spent 1k on the 1st, 1k, on the 5th and 1k on the 10th. Then you paid off 1k which cleared on say the 30th. You would pay interest on 3k for 20days, 2k for another 5 days and 1k for another 5 days.

seems perfectly acceptable to me. If you clear the balance you get it interest free, if you don't you pay interest from the day you made the purchase not the statement date.

phd

Transfer it all to a Smile card from the Co-op. 0% on transfers for 6 months and 10.5% apr thereafter. Cheapest around at the mo.

Pete

MattN

my barclaycard is 9.9% for purchases.

dsmith

Gee thanks that really helps to calc interest. I really want to swap credit cards every 6 months for work expenses