For practically the last decade we've seen the charge card change from something only the wealthy use to something practically every person in the united kingdom owns. I think the average number of credit cards per person in the united kingdom is 2 or 3 and I understand it's commonplace for people to have 5 charge cards in their wallet or purse! In my opinion the internet accounts for most of the change in mindset, not only to credit cards, but finance generally, across the UK. Something like 57 percent of UK homes have broadband access today which is obviously only set to increase with time. So, how has this affected credit card and finance industry during the last 10 years? Firstly, there has been an increase within new internet only banks and credit card issuers springing up. The traditional high road banks and building societies also produced their online brands and products. Many lending options on offer via the internet have additional benefits or lower rates of interes
t because the banks have less overheads and administrational work to complete if customers are applying and controlling their accounts online. The internet has fueled the consumer demand for charge cards and loans and certainly the banking institutions have only helped fan the fire by offering attractive 0 percent and low rate deals to be able to attract new customers and increase their own market share. More people have built up financial obligations on credit cards and loans than in the past and the total UK debt mountain now stands in a staggering £ 1430 billion. According in order to Credit Action Britain's personal debt is actually increasing by £ 1 million each and every 5 minutes. It's no wonder that the recession has hit the UK hard and people are now struggling maintain with repaying their debts. You might expect the charge card market to have taken a similar stumble but this is not the case so far. Amazingly, amongst all of the mortgage misery and repor
ts of home prices falling, credit cards seem to possess stood up to these issues. Today there are credit card issuers offering 15 month interest free upon purchases and balance transfers. The best charge card deals not so long ago were 12 months 0 percent for purchases and 13 months 0 percent for balance transfers, but even in the middle of the credit crunch we are seeing better deals available every month. This is good news for consumers but shouldn't mean that people continue spending on their card without taking into consideration the consequences; every credit card bill needs to be repaid. Credit card companies are continuing to improve their 0 per cent offers simply because they want new customers, and now looks like a great time to take advantage of these fantastic 0 percent deals. The main advantage with a 0 percent balance transfer period is the satisfaction it can give to customers wanting to keep interest payments at least.






Simon Duffy writes for the The actual Financial Blog a finance blog referring to all aspects of personal finance such as loans [http://www.thefinancialblog.co.uk/category/loans/], credit cards [http://www.thefinancialblog.co.uk/category/credit-cards/], and much more!

View this post on my blog: http://creditcard.valuegov.com/are-credit-card-offers-still-competitive/
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