Under the heading balance transfer credit card deals you will find several different options. We will take a look at a few of the deals available to help you decide what might be the best for you. Keep in mind that some of the deals are very similar from credit card issuer to issuer. The fine print will tell the differences in how these deals will work.
To begin you normally have to pay the balance transfer off first before any purchases will be paid. If you have a 0 percent deal with a purchase APR of 17 percent you will be paying interest on the purchases until the balance transfer has been paid. This is a key feature you need to know about the deals.
The first deal that is most popular is the 0 percent for 12 month balance transfer. You will not pay interest for a year. Along with this deal is usually a 3 month purchase rate deal of 0 percent interest. After the 3 months you are charged between 15.9 and 18.9 percent interest on purchases. After the balance transfer deal is over, you will also be paying that interest on the transfer. That is, unless you have paid it off.
Some of these deals come with charity cards, rewards cards, cashback, flight miles, or loyalty cards. In fact most balance transfer deals are in conjunction with a rewards programme of some type.
There are a few balance transfer deals that offer just the balance transfer and no purchase option. The 0 percent deals will last from 3 months to 15 months. Occasionally these deals have a cut off date. For example a credit card may say you have 0 percent interest until June of 2009. If you signed up in June 2008 you get a full year. Now it would be a half a year.
