Gordon Brown highlighted changes that could help consumers avoid debt problems and save them around £300million a year on their credit card debts. In a reversal of current industry practices, repayments on store card and credit card debt must be used to repay the most expensive debts first before cheaper borrowing. There will also be [...]
credit card debt
60% interest rates on credit card debts fuels debt problems
In a desperate attempt to secure credit, around a million customers have turned to sub-prime lenders charging 60% interest on outstanding credit card debts. The reported 2,700 people applying daily for sub-prime Provident’s Vanquish card will typically have a poor credit history, and may have experienced debt problems in the past. Average interest rates on [...]
Credit card debts up as consumer demand rises
For the first time since June last year, the demand for credit cards, overdrafts and personal loans was more than the amount being repaid by UK consumers. Bank of England figures showed that in December, the demand for consumer credit was up by £52m, driven predominantly by borrowing on credit cards. Whilst the interest rates [...]
Cheques to be cashed in!
The UK’s Payments Council said said yesterday that cheques will be phased out by October 31, 2018, stating that cheque use was in “long-term, terminal decline”. The decision came under attack last night from small businesses, pensioners’ groups and MPs. Cheque use has dwindled over the last twenty years. It has fallen over 40 per [...]
Debt Management worries ease as consumer borrowing falls
Debt Management providers have welcomed the news that consumer borrowing has recorded its biggest fall since Bank of England records began some 16 years ago. There has been a large increase in the number of people struggling with debt problems, and having to seek financial advice to improve their situation. Consumers have been turning to [...]
Credit card debt written-off in landmark court case
A judge has ruled in a landmark case that £8,000 worth of credit card debt could be written-off, after payment protection insurance (PPI) had been wrongly sold. The claim was made by Lynne Thorius against MBNA, after she was charged thousands of pounds in PPI premiums on the Sunderland FC credit card she had applied [...]
Credit card debts to grow warns IMF
Credit card debt in Britain will continue to worsen, with a wave of payment defaults from customers, according to a report by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF predicts Britain, which has the highest number of credit card borrowers in Europe, would suffer from much of the £1.5bn of consumer debt that it predicts [...]
Cheque ban could avoid debt management
The government will today unveil its consumer protection plans that will include a ban on credit card cheques. One of the main contributory factors to severe debt problems is too much credit card debt, and credit card cheques have simply made it far easier for a consumer to rack up big bills. Critics of the [...]
Debt management could help control credit card debt
Recent research has shown that people are cutting back on using plastic, in order to reduce the size of their credit card debt. According to figures from Tescocompare.com, more that a third of all individuals that are trying to spend less on credit, are doing so in order to shrink the overall size of their [...]
Plans to cut US credit card debts
New laws in the US that will make it deliberately harder for people to develop too much credit card debt, will be agreed today by President Barack Obama. The new restrictions, that are to be introduced next February, will put an end to some of the practices currently employed by credit card companies which have [...]
