Nine extremely long interest-free cards

With many balance transfer credit cards offering 15 months interest-free, how do you really know which one is best? We take a closer look.

Here at lovemoney.com HQ, we love to rave about how great 0% balance transfer credit cards are. After all, if you’ve got a lot of debt sitting on a credit card that’s racking up a lot of interest, why pay that interest when you can simply move your debt onto a 0% balance transfer card and pay absolutely no interest for over a year?

The trouble is, there are so many credit cards on the market, it can be really difficult to know which one to choose. Of course, it makes sense to plump for the card offering the longest interest-free deal. But what happens when many of the cards are offering exactly the same interest-free period? How do you distinguish between all your options?

The market-leader

Right now, the current market-leading 0% balance transfer credit card comes from the Yorkshire Bank and Clydesdale Bank (both part of the same group). This card offers 0% interest on all balance transfers for 16 months (3% transfer fee) – so that gives you well over a year to start tackling your debt, without worrying about the interest stacking up.

However, the drawback to this card is that you can only apply for it online if you are an existing customer of either of these banks. If you’re not, you will need to apply for it in-branch. And if you don't live in the northern half of Great Britain, branches can be few and far between. And even if you do live up north, you may still find that there's not a branch local to you.

So what are the other options? Well, if you can’t get hold of the card from Yorkshire Bank and Clydesdale Bank, there’s no need to panic. You can still get a very good deal from other lenders, and the best bit is, you’ll only lose out on one month of interest-free payments as there is awhole host of 0% balance transfer credit cards offering 15 months interest-free.

Lucky number 15

The great thing about the 0% balance transfer credit cards offering 15 months interest-free is that you won’t have to hunt out a branch to apply for these cards - you can apply for all of them online.

So let’s take a closer look at how they all compare:

At first glance, all of these cards look pretty similar. As well as offering a 15 month interest-free period on balance transfers, all but one of the cards (the First Direct Gold Card), offer three months interest-free on purchases. Just be warned however, you don’t want to use your card for spending if you’re also using it for a balance transfer, otherwise, in most cases, you’ll get stung by negative order of payment.

In fact, the only card in the chart above that operates positive order of payment is the Nationwide BS Gold Visa.

The typical APR on all of these cards is also the same at 16.9%, while the transfer fee is also pretty similar at 3% or 2.9%.

But is there more to these cards than meets the eye?

Getting down to the nitty-gritty

The table below highlights some of the extra things you need to know about these cards:

So as you can see, when we get down to the nitty-gritty, there are some differences. Although the fees charged in most cases are pretty similar for these cards, the main differences lie in how much you need to earn to apply for the card, and whether or not you’re a current account customer.

In fact, for four out of the eight cards (Halifax, Bank of Scotland HSBC and First Direct), you will need to be a current account holder if you want to apply. So this is worth bearing in mind if you are hoping to apply for any of these cards.

Meanwhile, the Nationwide BS Gold Visa is the only card to offer commission-free foreign transactions – where no additional charges for exchanging currency are added to generate profit for Nationwide. However, there is a 1% fee for processing transactions in certain currencies – you can read more about this here.

Will you get accepted?

So just how likely are you to get accepted for these cards? Unfortunately, I can’t give you a clear-cut answer, but having asked each lender, this is what I found out:

For the Barclaycard, it really boils down to your credit rating – the better it is, the greater your chances are of being accepted. You won’t get accepted if you’ve been declared bankrupt or if you have had a CCJ or IVA registered against you in the last five years.

Similarly, to get accepted for the Halifax card, you will need a good credit score. This means no CCJs and no bankruptcies.

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You will only get accepted for the Nationwide BS Gold Visa card if the lender believes you will be able to keep up with your repayments. Your income and how much debt you have outstanding elsewhere are both likely to be taken into account when your application is considered. And if you have been late with payments in the past, you’re less likely to get accepted for the card.

And finally, for the both the HSBC credit card and First Direct Gold card, applicants will be subject to the credit assessment process and affordability checks – so the better your credit rating, the more likely you are to be accepted.

So overall, the rule of thumb is you have more chance of getting accepted if you’re credit rating is squeaky clean – no surprises there.

However, if you’re concerned that your credit rating won’t be good enough, don’t immediately assume you won’t get accepted. It’s well worth checking your credit rating yourself – you can get a free credit report via lovemoney.com – and if you’re worried, there are ways to improve your credit rating. To find out how, make sure you read Improve your credit score: the quick dos and don’ts.

And hopefully, now you've seen the full break-down for these credit cards, you'll know which one suits your needs best.

More: 10 astonishing lies about credit ratings | The six best credit cards