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I was interested in this post as wanted to take out the Platinum card. However personal income doesn’t quite get over the requested income line. We have a 40+ yr old joint account and I have my account! Whilst no set amount is transferred across to my account every month money is transferred over. If I totted it up it would get me comfortably ‘over the line’. However, I’m getting vibes it needs to be a regular set amount. ( easy to set up)
My parents always had separate accounts, since marrying in 1948) . I only discovered this when my dad had a spell of illness and I set about understanding all their affaires. That was interesting. The discussion of bills etc and access to accounts on the demise of one of them ensued. The result of which was “we’ve opened a joint account. We’ve each put in £xxx amount. Cheque book and bank card are in the drawer. Here’s the PIN number “. Godsend when my dad died and his account was frozen and mum in early throes of dementia. Hurrah for PoA as well
What we are talking about is a regular payment – standing order to her own account and then applying after at least three months of this and clearly if you were thinking of cancelling it thereafter that would be quite inappropriate and again risk issues for your wife in respect of her application declarations which need to be taken very seriously and made in good faith.
What if after the SO has taken place, she then feels “adoring/loving” enough to send it back?! Or is that playing with fire?
What we are talking about is a regular payment – standing order to her own account and then applying after at least three months of this and clearly if you were thinking of cancelling it thereafter that would be quite inappropriate and again risk issues for your wife in respect of her application declarations which need to be taken very seriously and made in good faith.
What if after the SO has taken place, she then feels “adoring/loving” enough to send it back?! Or is that playing with fire?
I think the answer is fairly obvious. This needs to be genuine; it’s to resolve a genuine issue not for anyone to create fake income for an application.
On the subject of joint accounts, for many years my wife and I shared a current account with a big high street bank, as has been noted just incase something happened to me. She also had her own account from years back. Ultimately Mrs Swiss wasn’t using the joint account in any visible way to the bank and they got really sniffy about it. We reverted back to solo current accounts. They don’t make it easy.
On the subject of joint accounts, for many years my wife and I shared a current account with a big high street bank, as has been noted just incase something happened to me. She also had her own account from years back. Ultimately Mrs Swiss wasn’t using the joint account in any visible way to the bank and they got really sniffy about it. We reverted back to solo current accounts. They don’t make it easy.
Couldn’t you have put the direct debit for council tax/ electricity or something from that account? Even a £20 monthly donation to a charity would keep it going.
I pay almost all my bills using my cards, so I started sponsoring a child every time I am short of a direct debit 😊.
I was interested in this post as wanted to take out the Platinum card. However personal income doesn’t quite get over the requested income line. We have a 40+ yr old joint account and I have my account! Whilst no set amount is transferred across to my account every month money is transferred over. If I totted it up it would get me comfortably ‘over the line’. However, I’m getting vibes it needs to be a regular set amount. ( easy to set up)
My parents always had separate accounts, since marrying in 1948) . I only discovered this when my dad had a spell of illness and I set about understanding all their affaires. That was interesting. The discussion of bills etc and access to accounts on the demise of one of them ensued. The result of which was “we’ve opened a joint account. We’ve each put in £xxx amount. Cheque book and bank card are in the drawer. Here’s the PIN number “. Godsend when my dad died and his account was frozen and mum in early throes of dementia. Hurrah for PoA as well
Sorry to hear your dad passed. I’m glad to hear POA are helpful, I found it a real pain to set up and took ages. But hopefully well worth the effort if/when we may need it.
£20k ISA, £3k SIPP
For those who can’t imagine what to do with the “allowance” the above is a very simple answer, as well as paying off the card being taken out in the first place.
There’s also nothing remotely suspect about transferring some it into a joint account for household bills. (Sole earner’s sole account gets salary, they transfer some to joint account for bills, some to spouse for allowance, from which spouse also contributes to bills).
Keep it clean, transparent and most importantly reasonable (would make no sense for example for non earning spouse to be contributing more than the sole earner to the joint account) and this is all legitimate use of household earnings.
Couldn’t you have put the direct debit for council tax/ electricity or something from that account? Even a £20 monthly donation to a charity would keep it going.
No, the account was active – most of the household bills were paid from it – it’s just that my wife never operated it. She used the debit card on her account for purchases & ATM withdrawals, never logged in to online banking etc. Think at the time the deal was she paid for the groceries & stuff for the kids, I looked after everything else. Any surplus (haha) was put into the mortgage.
This is an interesting discussion that I’d not really thought through previously. My wife has no income and, as a result, has been unable to open a free Amex rewards card to replace her current gold card and keep her sizeable rewards balance intact.
To save the hassle of opening a single-name current account for her, @JDB would you think that standing orders into savings account/ISAs in her sole name would count from Alex’s perspective. I can’t see why not?
@jj savings do not count for her credit profile, it’s the debt risk e.g. current accounts, credit cards, mortgage etc.
If the Gold card has not been cancelled, ask Amex to downgrade the card to Rewards.
I have no income but over time can demonstrate my declared income of just over the Amex required minimum, so am able to apply for new cards via referrals. I will not go cold turkey with Amex for that reason, that I need to keep my profile and credit limit going.This is an interesting discussion that I’d not really thought through previously. My wife has no income and, as a result, has been unable to open a free Amex rewards card to replace her current gold card and keep her sizeable rewards balance intact.
To save the hassle of opening a single-name current account for her, @JDB would you think that standing orders into savings account/ISAs in her sole name would count from Alex’s perspective. I can’t see why not?
I think you answered your own question in stating “my wife has no income”. That would therefore be what your wife would have to put on her credit card application form assuming you both wish to be truthful. Credit card companies are principally interested in income and shouldn’t rely on expecting a customer to have to liquidate assets or savings.
I rather regret giving a simple good faith answer to the original poster based on my own personal experience and that of friends and family who have no/low earning partners who want their own cards. If you offer the partner/spouse a regular long term income to spend as they wish, they are entitled to count that in making credit applications.
Unfortunately it seems to have spawned mainly questions about faking or recirculating income which risks the ‘donor’ causing the applicant to make a fraudulent application with terrible consequences for both.
@JDB, I’m definitely not interested in faking income! It simply hadn’t really occurred to me that I could quite legitimately give my wife an income out of my own if I wish (provided there is no double-counting, of course). The point I’m pondering is that I actually already do that by making monthly investments into accounts held in her sole name. So, although she doesn’t have a sole name current account, it’s fair to say that she does have a monthly income from me.
It’s been a long time since I worked with unsecured loans. In the mortgage world, most lenders don’t regard monthly contributions from family members as income, even where the payments are mandated by a court, as the source of funds can’t be properly underwritten and is therefore too uncertain to risk the loss of the borrower’s home of payments ceased. From your previous answer, it sounded as if you had knowledge of unsecured practice, and I was interested in your insights.
@jj – the transactions you described are a simple inter spousal transfer to take advantage of your wife’s tax allowances; I’m afraid they cannot possibly or honestly be described as her ‘income’. The regular funds transferred need to be spending money. There is no art to this, it’s really common sense.
I’m a little surprised by your comments re court ordered maintenance not counting towards income for the purposes of mortgages. Every Family Court in the land orders expert evidence from mortgage brokers to identify the mortgage capacity of the parties; it is central to the whole process of dividing assets and both maintenance and state benefits are most definitely considered as ‘income’ for these purposes. It’s critical to ensure the appropriate housing of the separating parties, particularly any party with parental responsibility.
Equally, regular payments from eg a parent will count as income for a separating party. It’s way outside my ken, but my wife deals with this stuff every day.
@JDB, on reflection, point taken on transfers for tax purposes.
I’m straying far from the original topic here, but I should clarify the mortgage point. Each lender will have its own policy on maintenance payments, and my involvement with mortgages is only in a specialist niche that may not be reflective of the wider market. In my experience, maintenance payments are seen as being less certain and of a lower quality than employment income, as they may be subject to avrupt change if the former partner were, for example, to leave the country, have a significant drop in income or be declared bankrupt. The absent partner cannot be credit scored or be asked to make declarations about the future, so it’s safest and easiest to ignore maintenance payments in an affordability assessment, and allow lenders with appropriate expertise to pick up these edge cases instead.
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