£25 less

Finance A short public service announcement.

If you received a Tesco Personal Finance credit card statement in the post this morning, I'd give it a once over despite your embarrassment, because there's an unheralded surprise. They've reduced the extent of the minimum payment from 3% to 2% -- but -- and this is important -- the interest rate hasn't chance. Which means that if you pay by direct debit and you only ever pay the minimum payment by direct debit, you'll actually be paying rather less of your balance off in comparison to interest each month. Mine is £25 less.

This is messy and annoying and unheralded by a letter to explain the change. Indeed when I phoned my old colleagues in the call centre, they initially said that it was an error then after looking some more agreed it was a feature. I'll be working out what the 3% amount would have been and make an extra payment, which if you'll pardon the expression, is just like sooo annoying. I know I would be as well after all these years to apply for a different credit card with better terms, especially since the club card points I get hardly justify the interest charges.

But I'm a chump.

I'll probably be with them until the end of time, or the finance system implodes, whichever is the sooner.