Zero Interest balance Transfer Cards Hit Australia

I posted earlier about how I had applied for a GE Money Mastercard that gave me 0% interest on balance transfers for 6 months.

Understandably I was mildly excited at this prospect as it was the first time I’d seen it offered in Australia. A little more research has revealed a few more options for zero percent interest balance transfer credit cards.

So far I’ve found offers from GE Money, ANZ and HSBC. There is also a plethora of offers from banks and other companies offering balance transfers at the 4-6% level.

I would love to move all my credit card to to these types of cards, however I’m unsure how I applying for all these extra credit cards would effect my credit rating in the short and long term.

I actually received aGold Mastercard offer from Citibank with 4.9% on balance transfers for until the transferred amount is repaid. According to the brochure I got with $15, 000 debt I would save over $1800 a year in interest. I’d love to be able to swap gold card two for one of these but I don’t think I’m going to qualify for an additional $15,000 worth of credit.

The Citibank Mastercard offer was addressed to the householder with my specific address already filled out on the application form. I guess there are some advantages in living in the smallest house in the most expensive suburb in my state. Everybody automatically thinks you’re loaded.

The downside of the Citibank offer is that all future purchase are charged at an interest rate of 18% where there are a lot of other cards on the Australian market now offering interest rates in the 10-12% range.

I need to do some more thinking before I go applying for anymore credit cards I think.