Having been lured by the temptation of extra Advantage points (and knowing I was about to put £170 on a Credit card for lovely Leeds festivals tickets) I decided to apply for the Boots Advantage Credit Card powered by Egg.
Benefits – Why do I want one of these Advantage thingies anyway?
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A review by eca99ajm on Boots Advantage Card Powered by Egg June 5th, 2001
Author's product rating:
Competitiveness of APR
Good
Product package
Good
Quality of Customer Service
Good
Reward Scheme
excellent
Additional Charges
low
Security and Privacy
good
Ease of Application
excellent
Advantages:
Advantage Points and Low(ish) Interest
Disadvantages:
Weird Repayment System
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
Having been lured by the temptation of extra Advantage points (and knowing I was about to put £170 on a Credit card for lovely Leeds festivals tickets) I decided to apply for the Boots Advantage Credit Card powered by Egg.
Benefits – Why do I want one of these Advantage thingies anyway?
If you shop at Boots you should be aware that you can collect 4 Advantage points on every pound you spend (actually you get 1 point per 25p and they round it up i.e 26p will get you 2 points!). Advantage points can then be redeemed on anything with a ‘*’ on the ticket in a Boots store. Free shampoo, deodorant or many other (slightly more exciting) things! Always a good thing! The Advantage Card powered by Egg allows you to get Advantage points whenever you use your card. You don’t just have to use it at Boots because it’s accepted at any store that accepts Visa (and that includes abroad because Egg provide you with a pin number). You can get 1 point per pound that you spend, which means if you use your card at a Boots you automatically get 5 points per £1! You also get 1000 advantage points when you sign up for the card.
The rates of interest are also pretty good. Currently you get 14.9% APR and 17.3 for cash advances. This is ok compared to my Natwest Mastercard, but to be honest this really doesn’t matter to me as I always pay off the full amount each month – I worry too much about getting into debt! There’s also no annual fee (if there was I wouldn’t have applied!).
Applying for the Card – easy as pie!
I have already got a Savings account with Egg (Internet only and so great rates of interest!) so applying for me was a doddle. To apply go directly to www.bootsadvantage.com or you can access the same page through the boots website (www.wellbeing.com) or the Egg website (www.egg.co.uk). You are faced with filling in a simple form, made even more simple if you already have an Egg account as they already have most of your details. They say they will accept or decline your application within 30 seconds of completing the form and this was definitely true for me. If they can’t for some reason provide you with an immediate answer they promise to get back to you within 24 hours. It says on the site that it should take you about 15 minutes to fill the form in, but in reality it took me much less time, everything is done over a secure link and both myself and my Dad (who has a non-Boots Egg card) have never had any security problems at all.
Delivery Times – Hello Mr Postman!
The form I had to sign arrives two days after I had applied on the Internet. Pretty speedy. I duly signed the form and sent it back in my prepaid envelope. My Pin number arrived about a week later, and my card arrived a week after that. I was relatively impressed! Before you can use your nice shiny new credit card, you do have to ‘activate it’ at www.bootsadvantage.com or over the phone. This is a really simple process, that would be ever simpler if the web designers had thought to put a link which says “Activate you card…” or something similar, but instead you have to float around hoping for the best. You actually activate the card by logging into your account, although it doesn’t mention it anywhere as far as I could see.
Room for Improvement? – surely not?!
When you apply you have to state whether you want to pay the full balance monthly (the option I plumped for!), a fixed amount every month (which you can then specify) or the minimum balance each month. Correct me if I’m wrong, but there doesn’t seem to be any really easy way of changing this. Like I said, I pay off the amount in full each month, but I appreciate the reason most people use Credit cards is so they can pay off things a bit at a time so Egg don’t seem to make it easy for you to be flexible.
Verdict!
A new way for me to spend money is not usually a good thing, but in this case I do get lovely advantage points every time I decide I really must buy that gorgeous top. The card arrived quickly, and aside from the small activation problem, I was impressed with the ease of filling in the forms and using the website. I would recommend this card to all you Ciaoers out there, but be wary of your spending habits!!!
Advantages: 0% interest on purchases for 6 months, 14.9% standard rate - see text Disadvantages: Repayment facilities and options are limited (see text for update)
...at both Egg direct and Boots Advantage, resulting in another refusal, I received a letter from Egg at my address to someone I had never heard of, and had certainly never lived here; the previous owner had the house from new, 70 years ago, and is now deceased. I contacted Egg, who were extremely helpful and patient at my ranting, they agreed to investigate and update their records, and confirmed that they would also investigate if there was any link ... ...I went on to the Boots Advantage site and again applied for a card, I too wanted this 0% interest rate on purchases for 6 months that my friends were enjoying. Must be third time lucky, bingo, they confirmed acceptance of my application and offered me a card immediately. The forms were received within a couple of days of the application, and my card about four weeks later. The application was easy to complete (and has improved since it's launch), ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Advantages: 0% APR for 6 months, 24hr internet access, low interest rates after the first 6 months Disadvantages: Postal problems have meant delayed cards
I was offered a Boots Advantage Credit card because I already had an Egg credit card and Egg are running this Boots badged brand. Since I have already got an Egg card, signing up was incredibly easy. All my details were already on file and I just had to fill in a request on the website and sign the printed forms sent to me at home.
The forms came through very quickly and I was hoping that I could use the 0% APR interest rate on all my Christmas ... ...initial application). I actually rang Boots Advantage because there was such a long gap between receiving my pin and getting my card and they were very helpful and apologised for the delay. Despite the inconvenience caused, I was very impressed with the speed and honesty of the customer service advisor (no excuses!) and wished I'd phoned earlier for peace of mind. I had had visions of someone having a field day spending on my new credit card...
...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Competitiveness of APR
Product package
Quality of Customer Ser...
Reward Scheme
Additional Charges
Security and Privacy
Ease of Application
very helpful
11.01.2001
Internet service Review ofBoots Advantage Card Powered by Eggby
Teresatait
Advantages: Gaining Boots Advantage points Disadvantages: Internet service not updated daily
I decided to use the boots advantage credit card as I already had an advantage card and liked using it to gain points on boots products. It does has limited use as points can only be 'spent' on selected products, normally Boots own! Personally I liked using it for Health and Beauty products which was ideal.
However, when I subscribed to the credit card I did have a few teething problems. The initial credit limit seemed to be quite low at £1000, ... ...Also, to begin with the Boots staff did not know how to use the Boots credit card to add points or to redeem them but this has improved now. I also had problems with the initial direct debit setup, which I put down to human error (wrong number entered, why does it always happen to me?). On the plus side earning points whilst you spend is great, statements were punctual and can be viewed on the internet and as long as you pay your balance in full ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Competitiveness of APR
Product package
Quality of Customer Ser...
Reward Scheme
Additional Charges
Security and Privacy
Ease of Application
helpful
08.04.2001
hey big spender Review ofBoots Advantage Card Powered by Eggby
Eudora
Advantages: More free cosmetics from Boots! Disadvantages: Internet Account can be Unreliable
...any real "rewards".
This Boots Advantage Card Powered by Egg is fantastic though - I use it to pay for things I'd have to buy anyway, and I get 1p free to spend at Boots for every pound I put on the card. OK, so I have to pay a separate bill than if I'd used a debit card - but when you can set up a direct debit, what difference does it make?! The web site can sometimes be unreliable, but this is compensated by the fact that the customner service ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Advantages: Extra points to spend at Boots, no interest for qualifying period Disadvantages: Temptation to spend, spend, spend!
...saw an ad for the Boots Advantage credit card powered by Egg. This card is excellent! I receive one point where ever and on what ever I use the card to purchase. And for the first 6 months there is no interest on any new purchases - bonus! This gives me the chance to clear my (interest based) overdraft whilst earning extra points to spend at Boots. If you pay off the total balance each month then you stand to benefit the most from this card as you ... ...The web site is very user friendly and if you need to telephone I have found the system quick and helpful.
This card is really meant for us girlies who love extra money to spend on cosmetics and tolietries; an excellent (and free if you pay off your balance each month) way to treat yourself!! ...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Advantages: No card - no bill Disadvantages: No card no spending spree!!
...Has anyone actually got one of these cards? The reason l ask, is that since 25/10/00 l am awaiting such a card. The card has since been reordered 4 times - l still have not got a thing. I have called there callcentre numerous times and the staff although apologetic can not do a thing but reorder this mysterious card!!
I am currently awaiting card number 4 - with no joy - l was told it should be with me in 7 to 10 working days (today is working day number 10) and l still have not received a thing.
Im beginning to think this is not worth the hassle - l very disappointed because previously l had heard only good reports about Egg - but my experience has been the opposite lm afraid....
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Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful
Advantages: Very good deal - 0% intro apr, 11.9% standard apr & 1% or 2% cash back Disadvantages: Poor customer service levels
....5% cashback at the time (AMEX blue now also offer 1% cashback by the way) - if you always pay off your balance on time then its cheaper than using a debit card both because of the cash back and the interest free period - the introductory deals will not last forever however as the growth of the customer base will eventually tail off i.e. there will be no point in Egg offering the extra special deals it does - catch these deals while you can ! - Having had my card almost since the inception of Egg and have been a little annoyed to see even better deals for new customers come along compared with the deal when I joined - fortunately I was able to take advantage of one of the newer deals by also applying for the "BootsAdvantageCardPoweredByEgg" i.e. I now in affect have two Eggcards - the deal when I joined for this card was 0% apr on purchases...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Advantages: Great interest rate, easy to use and service Disadvantages: Internet only servicing
...I took out an egg credit card in November 2000, tempted by the promise of 6 months at 2.5% on balance transfers (I was at the time paying the Lloyds TSB standard rate on Mastercard and something quite ridiculous on my Debenhams store card), and also the promise that if I linked my eggcard to my BootsAdvantagecard, I would get advantage points on everything I spent. (See bootsadvantage.com for the advantagecardpoweredbyegg, or egg.com for the plain old eggcard).
It's only been two months, but I have to say I'm delighted. I do everything over the net so don't have a box full of paperwork cluttering up my house, and also get a standard rate of 10.9% interest for doing it this way. The BootsAdvantage points don't add up to much, but at least they're something.
Egg e-mail me every month to let me know that my latest...
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Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
05.02.2001
