Strange thing happened over weekend. i received two letters, one saying i had to pick up a letter from a secure mailing company and another saying this was my Barclay Card pin number. Only thing was i have never appied for one? Anyway yesterday at work it seems this has happened over the weekend to awork mate. We checked the dates on our debit cards and both are due to run out in the year 2010, she is with Nat West and this was a Nat West card in her case. Again she has not applied for a card.Also the same secure delivery company.
I phoned the customer sevices number today and they said "oo if it turns up ignor it" I did tell them i dont want it, never asked for it and wanted them to record the fact.
I dont believe that this is just a chance thing. It has to be a new marketing ploy by the card companys. Wonder if anyone else has had this ?
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I'm buying a car on Sat, does anyone know if I pay for a bit with credit card, and the rest with cash or debit card will it give me any protection?
The Trading Standards Office are making people aware of the Following scam:
A card is posted through your door From a company called PDS Parcel Delivery Service) suggesting that they were unable to deliver a parcel and that you need to contact them on 0906 6611911 (a Premium rate number).
DO NOT call this number, as this is a mail scam Originating from Belize.
If you call the number and you start to hear a recorded message you will Already have been billed £15 for the phone call.
If you do receive a card with these Details, then please contact Royal Mail Fraud on 02072396655 or ICSTIS (the Premium rate service regulator) at www.icstis.org.uk <http:\\www.icstis.org.uk>
As long as the total value of the purchase is over £100 you are covered by your credit card company and they are liable for the full amount, even if you only put 1p on the credit card and pay the remainder by other means. Look up "Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974" on Google for further information.
http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/31/creditcards-31.htm
I don't know if your thing is a scam or not, but I was sent a debit card I didn't ask for by my bank last spring. I asked a friend who works in the bank's main office what the story was and he said it was the bank's policy to post new debit cards to everyone who had a bank account there. When I read the letter accompanying the card, I realised that the bank were going to make my existing card out of date within a couple of months of posting the new one, whether I used the new one or not. I wasn't too happy about it, but I'm not the complainy type and I just use the new card in exactly the same way as I used it before. Hasn't changed anything.
It was strange, though, and my friend in the bank offices said that week was a nightmare there with all the phone calls they got. Very sneaky, I think.
Chip and pin has helped to eliminate a lot of UK domestic card fraud so organized crime has tried to get round that be using the magstripe info that has been compromised in places where chip and pin is only starting to be used (US, Canada, Italy etc etc).
My question is this though, after the 4 months is up, is the interest on the purchase separated so i only pay interest on the car insurance or does it craftily get added to my total amount and i pay interest on the whole lot?
I am hoping to pay it off in the 4 months anyway but i'm just curious.
as if, cut up into 1 million pieces what poor and annoying marketing if anything that would make me less likely to get one in the future very tacky imo
I think , not 100% sure, you will pay interest on the monies spent after the o% purchase offer ends untill you clear the transfered balance.
I would imagine you will almost certainly pay interest on the whole balance (of purchases made on that card) once the 4 months are up as your balance transfer is interest free for a year.
The catch with a lot of these cards is that in the small print they have an "order of offset" if you don't pay the whole lot. In other words they will probably offset your payments firstly against your interest free balance transfer so they can charge interest on the purchases you make with the card.
First rule of balance transfers don't use the card for purchases. Use your old card for purchases and pay it off in full by the due date so you don't incur anymore interest charges on that card. Any surplus money pay off some of the interest free balance transfer.
That's probably a good idea, don't think i'll use my new card then
Keeps it simple!
One thing I didn't say is that you will be making at least a minimum payment against the balance transfer each month anyway although presumably the aim is to wipeout all your credit card debt so you need to do that within the interest free period if possible.
This is changing in January 2011, new regulations.
From then, all credit card lenders must offset payments firstly against your most expensive debt, before promotional rates or 0% offers.
You may find some credit card lenders are now starting to amend their terms, in anticipation of the requirement of January 2011.
But of course, until then Len's advice (above) should be heeded.
The FCA are going to be conducting a study into the UK credit card market because they think it's not working well for some consumers.
Anyway, by way of background, they are saying that UK consumers hold 70% of ALL the credit cards issued in Europe!
I just thought that was a staggering figure. Okay, I've got 3 myself, mainly to play games with maximising the amount of time between buying something and paying for it by taking account of the statement dates. All the same. Why are we so keen on them and other countries clearly aren't? Do other countries not have the consumer credit protection we have? A question for @PragueAddick maybe? After all, they are absolutely essential for stuff like car rental, etc. So why don't Europeans have them?
BTW, according to the FCA, in the UK, 30 million consumers have a credit card accounting for £56.9 billion of outstanding debt. (That's around £1800 per person if my maths is right.)
Get a card with 'x' amount of months interest free credit, pay it off after the interest free credit period is over, take out another card with interet free credit.
I've not paid a penny in interest on a credit card for the last 15 years and I can dictate my own terms on paying back as long as I clear the debt by the end of the interest free period.
The only real change is that up until 6/7 years ago, you could transfer your balance for nothing, whereas now the charge between 2/3% - so I just don't bother.
The 'Barclays Premiercard' which offered interest free credit on STs and has now closed swapped everyone on it to interest free credit for life on the outstanding balance. I just pay the minimum amount each month and should clear it by the time I'm 123 years old :-)
Firstly in all three countries debit cards, and not credit cards are what people use. That also seems to be true in Scandinavia where people pay by card for just about everything, down to admission to the bogs in Copenhagen station. They want the convenience of paying by card but not getting into debt at the same time.
There is also resistance because of the merchant fees, which I believe are higher for credit cards. In the case of Germany this resistance is so high that many places don't take even debit cards from Visa or MC. Several times I've been to Praktiker (a German B&Q), and been forced to park my full trolley and head off in search of cash from an ATM. German places often cards which are part of the Eurocard system. Both my British and Czech banks used to be part of it, but have withdrawn from it, presumably under pressure from Visa. Brilliant work as usual from the customer friendly banks.
So, the European consumer doesn't get into debt, and merchant fees are lower- however I am not sure if the quid pro quo is that they don't have the consumer credit protection on their debit cards.