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"Many consumers are not switching to 0 percent credit cards"

By admin | April 10th, 2009 | Balance Transfers

According to a recent report many consumers in the UK are still failing to switch to 0 percent credit cards in order to save money on interest, despite the ongoing financial crisis and the struggle that many households are facing when it comes to their finances.

Using a 0 percent credit card can help many consumers to save a small fortune in interest, but many are losing out on this opportunity by failing to switch to a 0 percent credit card and continuing making repayments on their high interest credit cards.

With Christmas not long over many people are still struggling with credit card debt that was accrued over the festive season. However, rather than switching their accrued balance from a high interest credit card to a 0 percent credit card many consumers have simply continued to make repayments on their high interest cards. This means that a large proportion of their monthly repayment is being swallowed up in interest, increasing the time that it will take to repay the debt and increasing the total amount that will have to be repaid.

Worryingly, the research indicates that around two thirds of Brits have failed to switch to a 0 percent credit card, even though many had made a decision to do this once the festive season was over.

With around 56 percent of Brits thought to have used their credit cards to pay for purchases over the festive season this means that many people may be losing out on savings on their debt repayments.

One industry official said: “There are some fantastic 0% deals out there at the moment, for example the Virgin credit card offering 0% on balance transfers for 16 months as well as 0% on purchases for six months and special Virgin discounts. However, while 0% deals give you breathing space from interest charges, you should always try to make more than the minimum repayments in order to make progress on paying off your debt. If you don’t think you will have cleared your debt by the end of the 0% deal, you might be better off looking at lifetime balance transfer cards.”

Tags: 0% balance transfers, 0% credit cards

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