financial service providers

Hargreaves Lansdown are one of the UK’s leading independent financial service providers and asset management specialists. Our mission is to help investors make more of their investments by providing the best information, the best service and the best prices. We are quoted on London Stock Exchange and one of the 200 largest quoted companies by market capitalisation (value) in the UK.

We are a fund supermarket, a fund manager, a discount broker, a stockbroker, a pensions specialist, an annuity specialist, a wealth manager and a financial adviser - in other words a one-stop shop.

Click here to visit Hargreaves Lansdown

nationwide-home-insurance

Home Insurance Product Info

20% discount on your buildings and contents insurance when you buy them together online *

no extra charge for monthly payments

up to £1,000 cover for contents in the garden

Click here for a Home Insurance quote from the Nationwide

addicted to credit?

Credit was designed as a matter of convenience so you could make large purchases without running the risk of being whacked on the head and robbed because you were carrying a large wad of cash. Credit wasn’t intended as a way to extend your earning power. Yet so many options are open to us these days on credit. Let’s take for example, Mobile Phones, Credit Cards, Personal loans and Catalogues.

So how do you know if you are addicted to credit? Well, do you find yourself applying for credit you really don’t need? If you already have available credit and spot a new credit card which isn’t offering you a great deal, would you still apply? It’s always great to have an extra avenue of credit available, however, it’s easy to start relying on credit.

So what’s the purpose of all this?
Well, to see if you are using your available credit wisely why not take your credit cards out of your wallet and put them somewhere safe such as in a home safe etc. See if you can last without the temptaion of using them or applying for credit on “buy now pay later” for example.

If you are using an overdraft or taking cash advances often then thing’s aren’t looking too great, but you can still get yourself back into shape.

We all start of with good intentions of paying off our bills in full each month, however, the more credit we take, the more we have to spread these payments. Eventually, one small credit card repayment becomes several on top of any other agreements you may have.

Credit is not a bad thing, if you used wisely. If you can afford to pay for something with cash is it really better to leave it in your savings account and use the credit card?

Sure, you get a lot of extra protection and warranty when you pay by card but once you start making just the minimum repayments then you can easily end up in the credit addiction.

You probably don’t need us to tell you that Credit can lead to family break ups and a lot worse, however, using credit sensibly can help us buy today and pay later.

Just remember, circumstances can change, always try and live within your means, if your outgoings are exceeding your income, it’s not wise to take on extra credit, instead get some advice with your local citizen advice service. There are a lot of options available to you, Credit is not always the answer!

British Gas rise prices AGAIN!!!

Credit4everyone has learned that British Gas have increased prices again! Gas prices will increase by a record 35% and electricity by 9%. Despite the rise, British Gas has re-assured everyone that it will not increase prices again in 2008 (how nice of them I’m sure).

The prices have increased with immediate effect. You could save money by Switching, click here to see if you can save money

EDF increase prices

  5.5million customers will see an increase in the cost of it’s Gas and Electrcity after EDF announced it was increasing it’s fuel prices. Gas prices will increase by 22%, whilst Electricity will increase by 17% for domestic customers.

The firm has blamed the increase, which comes into effect on 25 July, on record wholesale energy costs.

Energy companies have been widely expected to raise the costs of utility bills this summer, as wholesale prices have been rising.

EDF is the first of the major suppliers to raise prices this summer and others are expected to follow suit.

The company said it had been absorbing higher costs in recent months but it now needed to pass on costs to domestic and small business customers.

It is the second rise for EDF customers this year.

To compare prices and see if you can get a better deal click here.

 

how to improve my credit rating fast

 

Think back a few years and it seemed like you only had to hit enter to get the message “Approved” for credit card applications.

In pre-credit crunch times, banks seemed to be offering high credit limits to all sorts of people. Now the lending criteria is getting tighter and even people with excellent credit scores are finding it more difficult to get approved.

So what do you do if you have a poor credit rating and are looking to rebuild it?

These days, on the market is a growing range of products targeted at borrowers with less than perfect credit histories, this doesn’t necessarily mean you’re a bad borrower, a low credit score can be triggered by previous credit problems from up to 6 years ago but can also stem from having no credit!

It may be that you are a student and you don’t have a regular income or you maybe self employed and unable to prove your income.

Always ensure you can afford credit before you apply, also, make sure you have checked your credit report, there may be a good chance your credit isn’t as bad as you first thought.

- Check your credit report free for 30 days with Equifax

- Check your credit report free for 30 days with Experian (Credit Expert)

Currently we are aware of 6 lenders offering credit cards for people with credit problems or no credit history.

These include

Bank of Scotland Classic card 
Barclaycard Initial
Capital One Classic card (Limits from £100 - £2,500)
Halifax Classic credit card
Vanquis Visa

The first and most important thing to realise is these cards have high APRs. So please be sure that you can afford to make repayments before taking on more credit. The idea behind these cards is simply, use the card every month, stay within the set credit limit, make payments on time, every month.

By paying the card balance in full every month you will eventually increase your credit score, once you credit rating has improved, you will be able to apply for mainstream lender such as MBNA, Barclaycard or HSBC.

 

10p tax losers ‘need more help’

Alistair Darling must do more to help the 1.1m low-income households still losing out as a result of the scrapping of the 10p tax rate, MPs have said.

A £2.7bn emergency package announced by the chancellor last month did not go far enough, the cross-party Commons Treasury committee said in a report.

The money had not been “well-targeted”, with £2bn going to middle-income workers who had not lost out, it added.

Mr Darling has said he wants to do more to help those not already compensated.

The committee’s report said the chancellor’s decision to raise the income tax threshold by £600 in May, at a cost of £2.7bn, was “probably the least bad option” to mitigate the impact of the abolition of the 10p rate.

It found the 5.3m losers from the initial decision were people on low incomes for whom the loss of up to £232 a year had dealt a “significant” blow to their finances.

This, it noted, came at a time of sharply rising prices for essential goods and services.

Some people were still estimated to be up to £112 a year worse off, the report said.

Bank mortgage lending falls 20%

Mortgage lending for house purchase by the UK’s main banks has fallen to its lowest level on record.

The British Bankers Association (BBA) said that in May, the number of new mortgage approvals to home buyers fell to just 28,000.

That was a 20% fall in just one month and 56% down from May last year.

The BBA said the number of new approvals was the lowest since its records started in 1997 and warned that the market would stay subdued.

“Measures of mortgage activity were lower in May as a result of tighter lending criteria and economic pressures on households,” said David Dooks of the BBA.

“Only remortgaging business is holding up, where people need or want to take advantage of deals with other lenders,” he added.

BBA members account for about two-thirds of total UK mortgage lending.

10p tax help too slow - Darling

Chancellor Alistair Darling has admitted to MPs that ministers should have moved “faster” to compensate those who lost out over the 10p tax rate.

And he said he wanted to do more to help the million people not compensated by his £2.7bn emergency package in May.

He said compensatory measures for the over-65s and many parents were brought in when the tax rate was scrapped.

But he said: “Should we have gone faster and further? Yes we should, which led to my announcement in May.”

Mr Darling was answering questions from MPs on the Treasury Select Committee which is holding an inquiry into the effects of the 10p tax band being axed.

Fiscal rules

Before he announced concessions in May, it was estimated that 5.3m low-paid people would have been left worse off by the change - which threatened to provoke a backbench rebellion by Labour MPs.

He told MPs he did not accept he had put the government’s own fiscal rules, which require public sector borrowing to be held below 40% of national income, at risk by his concessions.

He said it would have been wrong to take the money out of the economy, by tax increases elsewhere, at a time the economy was slowing.

In May, just weeks after the Budget and following a rebellion by Labour MPs, he announced a £2.7bn package effectively giving an extra £120 this year to all basic rate tax payers.

Conservative MP Philip Dunne quoted an interview Mr Darling did shortly after becoming chancellor, in which he said that any tax changes should be “made at the proper time, in the context of the Budget, or the pre-Budget report”.

Supermarkets to battle on prices

Supermarket giants have announced price promotions to outflank discount stores, which have risen in popularity.

Shoppers feeling the pinch have moved to no-frills stores, experts say, with Aldi and Lidl seeing strong growth.

Now Asda is selling 10 staple items such as bread and eggs for 50p over the weekend, and Tesco says it will cut the cost of 3,000 items on Monday.

Rising food prices were the biggest contributing factor to a big lift in consumer inflation in May.

Price cuts

Asda, owned by the US giant Wal-Mart, is advertising a promotion of basics, including sausages and bananas for 50p, from Friday to Sunday.

 

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