Credit Card InformationWe know that the credit card market can be a confusing place, and that trying to choose between the many cards on offer from the various issuers can be difficult. Many people will either just opt for the credit card that their bank offers them with their bank account, or will pick one based purely on the way it looks (we know it sounds crazy, but you’d be surprised at how many do this) or the one with the best advertising.
Given that you are here, we will assume that you do not fall into the above categories, and that you are actually going to give some thought to what credit card you choose, which is a very wise move, as you stand to save yourself a not insignificant of money in the long run. Weighing up the relative merits of different cards can be done by looking at the APR (Annual Percentage Rate) that they charge. This may sound simple, but it is actually slightly more complicated, you see in many cases the rates advertised are introductory ones, meaning they will revert to a higher rate at some point down the line, so the small-print needs to be checked to find out if this is the case. As well as the introductory periods to be aware of, the APR figure itself can be slightly misleading. It is not uncommon to see the APR qualified as ‘typical’ within the advertising, this means that the stated rate is what is offered to the majority of customers, but there is no guarantee that you would get the same rate. Besides the Interest rate there are other things to take into account, such as the ‘extras’ that the credit cards provide. These should really be seen as secondary to the charges of the card, and many of them will likely be of no use to you. Things like insurances on purchases if they go wrong may seem good, but in reality the goods will be under manufacturers warranty anyway. Not only that, but much of these seemingly ‘added extras’ are afforded to the card holder through the consumer credit act, it’s just the card companies like to dress it up a bit. Finding a cheap credit card can help you to not only lessen the costs of future credit, but with balance transfers you could also take advantage of the lower rates by moving your existing outstanding balance from you old card to a new one. Nought percent interest on balance transfer credit cards can still be found, however their proliferation isn’t as high as it was a year or two ago as many people realised that they could continually ‘hop’ cards and so escape any interest rate charges. This of course only cost the credit card issuers money, and so these deals have become more limited and with greater restrictions than they previously had, but they can still be very useful. More detailed information, and recommended credit card issuers, can be found on the other pages of this site, use the navigation on the right to get you on the road to finding the cheap credit card that you are looking for. |
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