If you’re the type of person who needs to have those everso important reward points and/or cashback credit cards then you’ll want to find one of these that offers a good deal on your balance transfer.

The balance transfer itself needs to be going to a credit card where they won’t charge you any interest at all for a long time.  This sounds pretty simple doesn’t it, but it isn’t, believe me.  Many credit cards will offer you up to 15 months interest free on balance transfers, but some of them may also charge you a one off percentage of your balance when you transfer.  You need to do the maths and work out if this is the best move for you before you switch.

Also remember that the 0% interest on your balance transfer is subject to terms and conditions.  The 0% interest will only exist on the balance you have transfered so don’t get confused by thinking the entire balance of the card will be interest free; it might sound a little ridiculous, but it’s surprising how many people actually fall for this one.  The problem is that credit card companies are not obliged to make it any clearer than they do all ready.  You don’t have to be a genius to own a credit card, you just have to have some money and a willingness to spend it.

Be careful when you switch your credit card, and always make sure that you get what YOU want.

This credit card giant is offering 0% interest free for a massive 15 months!  Now this could get a lot of people out of a lot of trouble.  I’ve been there before with a huge balance and no chance of ever being able to chip into it because the interest payments are crippling me.  Well Barclaycard offer you 15 months to get that balance down a little and make things a little more acheivable.  Of course, you’re better trying to pay it all off if you can; there is nothing that credit reference agencies like more than people who can pay off their balances but also like to take out credit too.

There is another added bonus to Barclaycard’s great 0% interest deal but it’s one that requires a little though and a lot willpower.  I almost don’t want to mention it in this post through fear of attracting the wrong kind of people to the deal, but i am obliged to tell you all.  Barclaycard have offset this 0% balance transfer deal with 3 months of 0% interest on your purchases too.  Now don’t get carried away, you said you wanted to clear your balance and there’s no chance of it like that is there?

Just like every other type of credit card feature, this lifetime balance transfer deal is also subject to several different companies who offer different rates and different rewards.  It’s up to us, here at credit card comparison, to help you make an informed decision on the credit cards that feature the most predominantly.

MBNA have a credit card that will offer you 6.7% interest on the lifetime of your balance transfer.  It is very important to verify this here and now because many people get the impression that this interest rate will be the same on your entire balance with MBNA; it won’t.  This is only for your balance transfer.  So let’s just say you’ve transferred a balance of £2000 and then you spend a further £1000 on the credit card.  The £2000 balance you transfered will be subject to the 6.7% interest and not the extra £1000 you spent on top of that.

MBNA offer a good credit card here if you’re not silly enough to spend a load more on it.  And it works out the very best way to shift a debt if you can pay it off in at least 4 years.

You could go for a credit card that offers you a significantly lower interest rate on your balance transfer for life, rather than up to 15 months.  This is handy for those people who are unable to keep up with the constant swapping of balances in order to avoid paying any interest.  Personally i think that the life balance transfer deal is a good one, and depending on how good the credit card is, it’s a real winner if you want to be loyal to one card.

You can always swap your balance a few times until you find the life balance transfer deal that suits you, and this is a very shrewd move since you bring the balance down even more.  Then when you finally find the card that suits you best of all you can enjoy comfortably low interest rates for life on the balance of your old credit card.  Be careful not to assume that you get this low rate on everything however!

But they do have a credit card that has some nice little benefits for those who can get past the dreadful name.  These benefits are pretty standard like the interest rate and the balance transfers etc, but what is a little disappointing to say the least is that there is no reward system in place.  This is why i have nicknamed the Santander credit card the boring card!  It’s all good and well being a powerful financial organisation and safe to use but the public want glitz and they want to save money on their shopping at the local supermarket or department store.  If you’re reading this Santander then you need to rethink!

Also you might want to take a closer look at their balance transfer rate.  Like many credit card companies at the moment, Santander offer a great 15 months interest free on balance transfers, and like these other companies they also charge you a fee to do it!  But when you compare Santander with companies like Barclaycard that also offer 15 months interest free, it’s worth knowing that Barclaycard offer a reward system, and also their charge on balance transfers is 2.9% whereas Santander is 3%.

So, as you can see the Santander credit card isn’t as good as the all the red lego TV adds and race car drivers would suggest.  Always compare your credit cards before making a decision.

And it is still a good idea, it’s just that the rules of play are slightly different now; slightly different in a good way and a bad way.  The good way is that the financial giants such as the one that can offer this 15 months at 0% interest – like Barclaycard – are giving away much more interest free time than what they did in the late 80s and early 90s.  So you would think that’s progress wouldn’t you?

Well it is and it isn’t.  You must always look at the deal/offer very carefully and never forget that the credit card company that you’re dealing with wants (indeed needs) to make money, and they’re not just likely to give you the opportunity to pay them nothing at all; that’s not how they do business!  The only real way to make a deal like this work for you is if you have a balance that you are able to pay off at the end of the 15 months interest free; so you need to have a pretty good job!  To get the Barclaycard Platinum you have to have quite a bit of money anyway.  The reason for this is that there is an almost hidden 2.9% fee on your transfer.  For this reason you need to make sure it’s going to be worth while switching and whether you’re going to make a significant enough saving; there may well be others that would suit you better.

Shop around.

Sometimes you have a balance that could do with serious help and not just remedial damage control.  There are a variety of credit cards out there at the moment that don’t offer 0% on balance transfers but offer a very low interest rate for the life of the balance transfer!  Now that might not sound great, but your balance transfer could have quite a long life, and it’s quite possible you could run out of 0% balance transfer credit cards to swap between!

So if that interests you then i suggest you use someone like MBNA, i think their offer may still be available.  But if it is 0% interest then you do need the longest possible deals available don’t you?  Well there are a few that can be had and here’s a list of a few of them.

• Virgin Credit Card offers 16 months at 0% interest on balance transfers.
• Barclaycard offers 15 months at 0% interest on balance transfers.
• HSBC offers 15 months at 0% interest on balance transfers.

There are quite a few more out there offering good deals, and you shouldn’t only be attracted by the 0% interest on balance transfers, you should concentrate on the other things important to you like loyalty programmes or cashback too.

This is the good old balance transfer strategy of course.  I remember when people started talking about this about 20 years ago, and about how they have cheated the credit card company by not paying them back the balance of their account, or any interest.  It was naive then, and it is now, but it no less useful!

You can indeed spend up to your limit and then make no payments at all.  What you can then do is transfer the balance to another credit card company at 0% interest for around 6 months, and before you know it you only ever end up paying the minimum amount to your credit card.  As soon as you are due to be charged any interest on your credit card balance, simply transfer the balance.

It all depends on your credit rating really, just how acheivable this is, and the problem is that it’s usually the people who have enough money not to bother with ideas like this, are the ones who are enabled to actually do it!  But you never know.  And this is why it’s a good idea not to max out your card before you’ve attempted at least one balance transfer.

Try it out, but be careful and compare the credit cards carefully (reading all the small print!)

Alternatively you can use a credit card comparison website such as this one in order to find the credit cards that are offering the best deals on credit card transfers.  For those of you who are unawar, a transfers are a way of moving the balance of one credit card to another credit card, usually in order to pay no interest on you card; now it doesn’t always work like this you know, and sometimes you can get burned.

When it works best is when you are paying back in excess of say £50 per month on goods you bought ages ago.  This shows that your balance is hardly going down and that perhas now is the time for your retirment.  But you can swap you overall balance on the account to a credit card that offers 0% interest for a limited period.

What you have to do is do a simple credit card comparison.  Many sites these days have databases and various different menus etc to allow you to compare your credit cards in a particular way.  So what you need to do is compare balance transfers.

You need to transfer the balance of the credit card you are going to struggle with, to one that allows you a lower rate of interest, or if at all possible, no interest at all for a limited time.  This should buy you a little time, and if you’re really shrewd you can compare credit cards again when this limited time runs out, just to see if you can do it again.  I know it’s time consuming, but it’s certainly worthwhile doing, and you can save yourself pounds and pounds.

MBNA offer a balance transfer rate of 0% at the moment until September 2010.  This is perfect, but i must confess to not having read the small print, and besides there isn’t room here for me to write it all out for you.  Be sure to always do this when you compare credit cards.

Halifax also offer 0% interest on balance transfers, but this is just for nine months, so not as good as MBNA.  However, what you must consider when comparing credit cards like these two is that both of them then have a typical APR of 15.0% which is quite high.  Unless you are able to transfer balance again it may not be worth it in the long run.