Recent Credit Card Developments In The UK

Much has happened in credit card land in the US since the credit crisis blew up in 2008 – cash rebates reduced, no more caps on balance transfer fees, credit card issuers reducing credit lines and increasing rates. Today, I have got a guest post from a UK credit card site about what is happening across the Atlantic.

This is a guest post by the Editor of www.compareandsave.com, a leading website that compare credit cards in the UK. Firstly, I would like to thank Mr Credit Card for letting us share our thoughts on what is happening in the UK. In this article, we will be updated about recent credit card developments in the UK by our overseas source. As Mr Credit Card himself said ‘the credit crisis started in the US’, but it didn’t take long for the impact to be felt over here in the UK. Now I’m going to fill you in on exactly how it has affected us, aside from the obvious tightened lending criteria, which is making it harder for people to get the credit card they want.

Credit card fraud
Unfortunately, fraudsters have tried using the current economic situation to their advantage by playing on consumers’ insecurities and their desperation for a bit of extra cash. Recent news revealed that a new phishing scheme had begun where fraudsters were sending emails to taxpayers telling them they were entitled to a tax rebate. The email would more than likely contain an embedded link which would send the consumer to a fake website where they would be encouraged to give their credit card details so that they could be given their tax rebate. Indeed, it is on the government’s agenda to tackle credit card fraud and phishing because British consumers make twice as many internet transactions than the European average and therefore they are “twice as likely” to be a victim of online fraud.

Credit cards for everything
Experts in the field have been encouraging those consumers in the UK who can afford to pay their credit card bills off in full at the end of the month to steer away from using debit payment cards and instead start making use of cash back credit cards. Plus, more bizarrely, some airlines are considering making people pay to use the toilets on their aircrafts. Because Boeing can’t come up with the technology for the toilets to be coin-operated, they are trying to make them accept credit cards. In addition, coin-operated parking meters are increasingly being replaced by units which accept credit card payments in the hopes that this will reduce the number of people getting tickets because they don’t have the correct change to ‘feed’ the meters.
Balance transfer credit cards.

The offers on balance transfer credit cards have fluctuated a little over the past eight or nine months. Before Christmas they started to reduce in length slightly and admin fees, which are charged when you choose to transfer debt from your existing credit card to a balance transfer credit card, remained at between 2.5% and 3%.

In the past couple of months, offers have started to pick up with the current market-leading offer standing at 16 months on the Virgin Credit Card and most others ranging from nine to 13 months.

0% purchase offers
Gone are the days of credit cards coming with 12 months 0% on balance transfers and 0% on purchases. Instead, 0% purchase offers have come down to as little as three months in some cases, with the general rule being the longer the balance transfer offer, the shorter the interest-free purchase offer. We have also seen an increase in the number of providers offering low-rate products which offer the consumer a low rate of around 8.5% on both balance transfers and purchases for the life of the balance and with no admin fee.

What’s to come in 2009
We expect to see an increase in the number of people looking for credit building cards and prepaid cards as they seek to gain back control of their finances.
We think lending criteria will loosen slightly as the economic situation improves. However, we think that credit card rates will stay high to compensate for the extra risk consumers are perceived to be posing to providers because of the current economic climate.