Halifax credit card debt and the ‘help’ offered.

[Icantrememberthenameoftheartis]

So today I took a deep breath and called Halifax to discuss the credit card I have that I’m now 3 months in arrears with payments

The call took over an hour to go through outgoings, income, why I’m in this position etc and eventually to discuss my options.

Well, the only option they gave me was to close my credit card, stop all interest being added which would happen anyway, set up an affordable payment plan to repay the balance, it was all sounding ok until she finished with ‘a default will be listed on your credit score to show you’ve defaulted’.

No other options offered!

And yet on their website there are lots of ‘Call us we’re here to help’ messaging!

I’ve had the credit card for five years and always paid until being made redundant thanks to Covid. I made that clear to them too!

Is this really the only option available does anyone know?

Banks are extremely risk averse at the moment, they won’t provide leeway like an interest freeze. What they have advised sounds about right.

Pre-pandemic, I complained to Barclaycard and they froze the interest for 12 months. My complaint was rude customer service related, so it had nothing to do with me financially struggling or needing payment leeway from Barclaycard - freezing the interest was just their standard complaint resolution! (alongside compensation of course)

From what I have heard, Barclaycard now no longer freeze interest when at one point it was a standard goodwill gesture. This is to stop customers from getting further into the debt, and in turn protect the bank from risk