Expert: move away from credit cards to avoid needing debt help
Expert: move away from credit cards to avoid needing debt help
- Friday, 5 March 2010Consumers will find themselves needing
debt help if they do not move away from relying on credit cards, according to one expert.
Mark Lyonette, chief executive at the Association of British Credit Unions Limited, said that despite being "famously convenient", the credit union sector "generally" believes they are not a good product.
"With minimum repayments, you could be on your tenth card and gradually leveraging yourself to the point where you are going to explode," he said.
"There are some shocking things that are going on - and have gone on - in the credit market which are not just to do with interest rates."
Changing the accepted notion of buying on credit as opposed to saving to purchase has "got to be part of the solution", added Mr Lyonette.
Latest figures from Credit Action reveal that total consumer credit lending to individuals at the end of January was £225 billion.
The average owed by every UK adult is now £30,306 including mortgages, which equates to 129 per cent of average earnings.

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