If you are familiar with the term - 'pinching from Peter to pay Paul' and are currently adopting this exact mentality where your credit cards and other bills are concerned, it really is time to read this article and heed the advice.

It is a fact that this position is a very dangerous one to be in, if a Mastercard bill lands on your doormat and you have to use another credit card to pay the minimum amount - your debt will only ever escalate and the situation will continue to get out of hand.

By paying the minimum amount each month, the majority of that payment will go towards paying off the interest that has accrued over the last month. All credit card statements are legally obliged to indicate the estimated interest payment for the next month and when you deduct this from the minimum payment, it usually only leaves a few pounds to actually clear the balance. (more...)

Regulation focusing on debt could actually harm consumers if it ends up restricting access to credit, the Finance & Leasing Association (FLA) has warned.

In reference to the Government's proposed rules about credit card and store card debt, the FLA has cautioned that the consumer credit market is continuing to shrink, with credit card and store card spending levels in August down 8% and 12% respectively, compared with August last year.

Fiona Hoyle, Head of Consumer Finance at the FLA, warned that "as our statistics today show, credit spending is still declining. We must avoid the risk of reducing further the availability of credit or increasing the potential for over-indebtedness ". (more...)

If you are tending to find that your pension and any other income is failing to keep your head above water and your credit cards and other debts are starting to get out of hand, this article may well be for you? There are not that many options open to people who have retired, but we will offer some advice on one of the most common.

If you own your own home and have equity in it, there is an option known as an equity release lifetime mortgage that may well be of particular interest to you. This is basically when you are lent a percentage of the value of your equity and you then repay this amount upon your death. English law dictates that you cannot be evicted from the property, whilst you are alive, and this means you will be able to remain in your own home.

Do not presume that this matter is as straight forward as this, however. There are a few things you will need to investigate before you sign on the dotted line for that agreement, receive the cash and start paying off those credit cards. (more...)

In this current economic climate, one of the most unfortunate and inevitable consequences is the fact that people are increasingly falling into debt. Food prices are definitely rising, every week, and so too are the other costs in life. Couple this with the fact that people are having their hours cut at work, pay slashed and are even being made redundant from their roles of employment and it soon becomes easy to see why.

If you find yourself in this position, there is something that you can do, rather than relying on your credit cards or other loans to tide you over. If you are sitting on plenty of positive equity in the property in which you reside, one option is to consider an equity release plan.

If you do go down this route, it is vitally important that you use the funds to pay off your credit cards and other debts straight away. Otherwise you really should not even contemplate this type of plan in the first place as this will only mean that you have less financial security behind you for nothing. (more...)

Excuse me a minute here, while I suck air through my teeth and tut several times over the very thought of using a credit card for money exchange. This is one big and almighty no!

You see, whenever you use a credit card to exchange money for your travels, these companies rub their hands together in ecstatic glee, as they contemplate the fact that they are going to make a nice sum through the cash advance fee they are about to whack you with. Credit card companies live and breath to rip their customers off with such shocking and arbitrary charges.

So, get the idea of using your credit card for foreign currency out of your head altogether. If this is the only way you can afford to buy your currency, it is highly likely that you could not afford to go on this holiday in the first place and mounting-up such debt, could prove to be a slippery slope to far more extreme problems in the future. (more...)