Card work

[j4]

A few weeks ago I finally got round to cancelling three credit cards (leaving me with just one, which is quite enough). The three to get the chop were:

• HSBC - the card I got with my student account in 1996, heavily used until about 6 months ago
• Egg - a card I originally got on a 0% balance transfer deal to help me pay off the HSBC card, and had used occasionally thereafter
• first direct - ditto, except that I hardly ever used this card after the initial balance transfer

The banks' different approaches to cancelling the cards were interesting to note.

• first direct eventually sent a clear and official-looking letter and form with a pre-paid envelope to confirm cancellation and return my card (cut in half).
• Egg phoned me up fairly promptly to confirm that I wanted to cancel, to tell me that I didn't need to return the card so long as I destroyed it, to ask me why I was cancelling it (on being told "I just don't need more than one credit card" they just said "fair enough!" and didn't push or argue) and to read me the small print (I can't reapply within 12 months).
• HSBC ... nada. Absolutely no checking, no acknowledgement, but I can no longer log in to my online banking, so I assume they have closed the account. (Some of you may remember that it took me FIVE MONTHS to close my current account with them, and when I finally managed to overcome their obstructiveness to achieve this -- after several phone calls and two visits to the branch -- I asked them to send me a closing statement; they said they would, and never did.)

I was rather hoping that HSBC would ask me why I was leaving, and they didn't even do that, so I didn't have a chance to tell them it was because of their consistently appalling customer service, uncompetitive rates, unhelpful staff, total lack of communication, and generally being as much use as a chocolate fireguard. A mouldy chocolate fireguard. It seems a bit pointless writing to them now to complain about a service I no longer use, but instead I'll just disrecommend them here.

The annoying thing is that HSBC are one of the (as far as I can tell) very few banks who explicitly offer a house-sharing mortgage for up to four people. Unfortunately I wouldn't trust them to organise the proverbial drinking spree in a drink-producing establishment, let alone to manage a mortgage, so I'm just hoping that some more competent banks will start to offer the same. (Not because I'm personally interested in it, just because I think it's a Good Thing!)

Comments

[emperor]

I have an HSBC card, because it's the only one I have with a plausibly-large credit limit. My other bank, Nationwide, are just as inept, sadly :(

[j4.livejournal.com]

How big a credit limit do you need? None of the cards I took out seemed to have any problem with offering me 3K or thereabouts, and kept upping the credit limit to try to entice me to get into debt; but I can't imagine ever wanting to spend anything like that much on credit. I suppose if you were using it for the downpayment on a house or something, but then surely there are better ways to get loans!

[aardvark179.livejournal.com]

I've put large amounts on the credit card before now, but those were things I was going to pay off immediately, and I only used the credit card because then I could ask them to send in the attack lawyers if it all went wrong.

[emperor]

This is roughly my approach; I buy things online with a credit card, too. I don't use it for borrowing, but Nationwide would only give atreic and I 1k, which doesn't last very long when you're buying white goods &c.

[imc.livejournal.com]

Indeed, when I moved house (nearly ten years ago now, gosh) I spent about £5,000 on white goods on two credit cards which I immediately paid off.

Unfortunately, now I've been married for a few years, the ability to pay my credit cards off each month is but a distant memory. Le sigh.

[aardvark179.livejournal.com]

I hesitate to ask what your definition of white goods is. To me it means washing machines and freezers and stuff like that, and unless I'm trying to freeze all my victims I can't see how I would spend £5000 on same.

Now a nice sofa, that's an expensive item.

[imc.livejournal.com]

I may be misremembering (let's make it £3,000), but also I'm including black goods too (TV, hi-fi). Cooker is probably the most expensive thing you missed out in your list. It was a completely unfurnished house. I spent over a grand at Argos (not on white goods). It was quite fun…

[aardvark179.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, if you include a cooker and black goods then I can easily see how you reach £5K.