A great way to get better credit card rates

 

Move the balance you owe on your credit card to another card, at a different bank, at a lower interest rate. This is called ‘balance transfer’, because you’re not cancelling the debt – you’re just transferring it to another credit card.

You could get a lower interest rate if you take advantage of promotional deals offered to existing and new Nedbank credit card customers.

Why it makes sense to do it

Some banks will demand that you also open a bank account if you want a credit card with them. This is not the case with Nedbank. The main reason you want to consider balance transfer, though, is to save money, which you’ll do if the new card has a lower interest rate than your current card – a good reason to take advantage of our promotional interest rates.

You can then pay off the balance faster, by continuing to pay the same amount you’re used to. This will reduce the total amount of interest you pay, too. Or you can take advantage of the lower interest rate to pay less every month – as long as you always pay the minimum amount due – and in that way free up some cash for other expenses.

The amount you can transfer depends on how much credit you have available on your card. So, if the limit on your existing Nedbank card is R20,000 and you’ve used up R10,000, you’ll be able to transfer only R10,000 from another card.

If you do transfer R10,000, then your Nedbank card will be at your credit limit – although you’ll now have a lower interest rate on that debt. This lower rate will apply for a limited time, determined by the terms of the balance transfer promotion.

How to do it

Nedbank will contact you to present promotional balance transfer offers that may be available for you.

If you apply for a new credit card or an increase on your existing Nedbank credit card limit, an automatic check will be done on approval to see if we can move over balances for you so you can do a balance transfer and start saving. We will settle your current debt by making a payment directly into your other card account. If you would like to, you can close that account and save on unnecessary additional fees.

Going forward, you now enjoy the benefits of the lower interest rate for the agreed period. Using balance transfer in this way is a clever way to improve your household finances.

Taking on new debt or jumping from one credit card to another without ever getting control of your debt is obviously not a good idea. But it makes sense to use ways like balance transfer to help manage your money responsibly.