I'm confused, as I am getting conflicting messages about this card. One is that "there is no interest free credit period". The other is that you have "up to 50 days interest free credit". If - say - the statement date is
1/1/06, how soon after that do you have to pay before incurring the "typical" 6.9% interest charge? I can't see any relevant information on the Egg web site. (Typical? I've been an Egg customer for over 6 years, and I was offered 15.9%. I have an "excellent" credit record - according to Experian.)
But isn't this card the OP talks about their new-fangled con which is designed to act as a savings as well as credit facility that has no such delay before interest is charged?
If the card is "pre-loaded" you get 4% in-credit interest. Every payment you make reduces your balance. If you use the card as a savings account you therefore lose the benefit of the interest free credit.
You gain a higher interest rate and the money earns more days of interest if you keep the money in an Egg savings account. Payments from the s/a to the c/c are same day.
The Egg Money card also earns 1% cashback on purchases, up to £200 per annum.
Thanks Chris. Part of my confusion was caused by the "helpful" gentleman from Egg who phoned me to "explain" how the card was to be used. "Basically you should use it like a debit card." "There is no interest free credit period." (Yes he did say that.) Myself I prefer to hear the experience of somebody who actually uses the card, so again thanks. Why couldn't Egg make this clear somewhere though? Hopefully not like they made my debit interest rate clear - it went from "to be advised" to "as previously notified"! (He phoned me when I moaned having - after a secure message - been told that it would be 15.9%, and not surprisingly jumped up and down a bit.)
I like the idea of prepayng into the card, as otherwise the money would languish in my current account getting 0.1% interest. (Ok I know...) Lets hope that they are rather more competent in managing the card than they were setting it up though.
As for long term, I have my doubts. I took out the original Visa card because of the 1% cashback. They then reduced it to 0.5% "in response to overwhelming customer demand", which is when I stopped using it. Later it was reduced to 0.1% then abolished altogether. Despite hardly using it for the last 4 years, they regularly referred to me as "one of their most valued customers", and kept raising the credit limit. These people certainly have a good line in doubletalk.
I don't think its a good idea to keep a credit balance in the Egg Money card account. For one thing, 4% is not a particularly good rate of interest. You can do better than that elsewhere. Secondly, they debit your credit card transactions from your positive balance on the day they are charged to your account, so you don't get any interest free period at all.
Just use the card as you would any other credit card. Pay off the account in full on the due date, and get the 1% cashback each year.
Ignore my last comment. I misread "isn't this" for "this isn't" in your post, which gave it an entirely different meaning. I must get something done about my dyslexia. ;-)
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