Some of the worst cases are examples of credit card companies putting up rates on borrowers who have never made a late payment by as much as 100%. That could mean that if you had dept of £10,000 on your credit card interest repayments would leap from £133 a month to £291.

However you are not helpless if you find your rate is unfairly going up. If you complain, there is a very good chance that your rate will be reduced by your lender.

If your credit card company is unwilling to cooperate with you on the matter than you always have the option of switching your balance to another credit card with a lower rate, that is provided you have a good credit record.

Those that seem to be the main targets of credit card firms are those with debts elsewhere, those with large balances and those who default on their payments. However, many blameless customers are finding themselves targeted too.

Firms are pointing to the credit crunch for their unfair treatment of some customers, claiming that they are expecting reduced profits and so are trying to plug the gap by other means.

Since the credit crunch struck, the amount of liquidity in the market has diminished considerably. This leaves banks, lenders and card companies with a much smaller pool of cash to lend out as personal loans, card balances and mortgages.

It is estimated that in the past six months, the period in which the credit crunch has really started to bite, credit card companies’ have introduced 125 different fee or rate increases. Additionally, mortgage companies have been slashing the number of home loan products on the markets and loan applications – particularly for bad credit loans – are increasingly turned down.

One of the easiest ways to ensure that you will have access to credit when you want it is to review your credit report at regular intervals.

Lenders always look at your credit record when they receive a new application for credit. They also have a scoring system they use in order to decide whether or not to lend money to applicants. The score you get not only determines whether or not you are rejected but can also determine at what price you will secure the loan. The better your credit score is the better your chances are off getting a low-rate loan.

While it is a good idea to check your credit report, different research has found that over one third of Britons do not know what their credit report is for, while 20% of borrowers have no idea that a credit report even exists in their name. Only a quarter of all borrowers have checked their credit rating in the past 5 years.

It is very easy to get a hold of your credit report. All you need to do is apply to one of the three main credit reference agencies which are Experian, Equifax or Callcredit. Any one of them will be able to provide you with a statutory credit for £2.

If you want to secure a personal loan, apply for a credit card or use a home loan to buy your first property, your credit record is a major part of the process. Knowing how the system works and what is on that report is of great benefit to borrowers.

Since the government bailed out the beleaguered lender earlier this year, it has been holding £24bn of government funds, a figure it aims to reduce to £1bn by 2009.  It aims to do this by refusing to renew loans held by current short-term borrowers when their deal expires, instead directing these mortgage holders to go elsewhere for better rates.

This year somewhere between £25bn and £30bn of home loan deals will end for Northern Rock customers. Refusing to allow these borrowers further funds will reduce Northern Rock’s borrowing drastically and allow it a greater proportion of liquidity.

The lender has already been contacting clients to let them know that expiring deals will not be renewable for the foreseeable future. Whilst this move may not be popular with all clients, for some it will come as a relief, as the tenuous position of the bank before its rescue was a source of anxiety for many of its customers.

This new lending stance is in stark contrast to Northern Rock’s position last year as one of the most aggressive loan lenders on the market. However, as has been seen in America, those lenders with the easiest borrowing criteria are the first to suffer when a credit crisis hits, due to the large amount of bad credit loans they hold; always the first to be defaulted on in tough financial times.

While these estimates differ by roughly £15,000 which is a substantial amount the message both indexes give is the same; House prices have dramatically risen since 2005 when the property market slowed down for almost a year. The Land Registry figures show that house prices have gone up by 15% in the last two years, while Halifax’s average price index has increased by 18% over the same time period.

Back in the autumn of 2005 most experts were warning of a prolonged period of house price stagnation, however that prediction didn’t materialise at the time. At the time the predictions were based on the grounds that many reports showed falling house price prices as well as the fact house prices had increased by 165% between 1995 and 2005 from £61,000 to £162,783.

The reason these predictions failed to materialise at the time is partly down to a change in lending policy by banks and building societies. Banks started offering larger and larger home loans by basing lending on affordability rates rather than the traditional way of lending by basing lending on income multiple levels. This action allowed borrowers to take out mortgages that were up to five times their individual or joint salaries as opposed to the three and a half times individual salaries and two and a half time joint salary. When affordability was still stretched, interest-only loans came on the market, followed by 100% and even 125% LTV loans.

Banks are getting rid of deals as fears that the UK could be heading towards its first property crash in 17 years begin to mount. The number of mortgages now on offer have gone down by 40% in three months and thing are only expected to get worse for the foreseeable future.

Only this week, the last 100% home loan on the market was withdrawn, and borrowers are finding it increasingly difficult to secure even a 97% deal.

However as bad as things seem to be there are still some good deals out there if you are prepared to do a little detective work. Make sure if you do find a good deal you don’t rush into signing anything until you have asked all the right questions. The longer you search the more familiar you will get at spotting a good deal or a bad deal.

Don’t only focus on the interest rate of the mortgage but also look at how much the fees are. Some mortgages are low interest super fee mortgages which can eat up any benefit of the low interest rates. With house prices having dropped in March by their largest amount in 16 years, the time could be right for a buyer who has saved their deposit and secured their loan.

Mortgage repayments have consumed the greatest proportion of take home pay for the last 17 years. The lowest earners as well as first time buyer couples now typically need to use their joint salaries in order to be able to afford the repayments on a home loan according to research out by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics).

A separate study out by the TUC also shows that the average price of a house in the UK has gone up more than four times faster than that of the wage of the average UK employee over the past 10 years. Although house prices have recently dropped by their fastest rate in sixteen years, prices are still high.

The Rics study found that in order to cover the stamp duty, cost of a deposit and legal fees, a first time buyer will typically need to save £25,600. A couple in the lowest earning bracket will earn roughly £25,899 a year between them which is only £299 more than the minimum required to purchase a house.

Some areas of the UK are better for affordability than others. In the North-West upfront buying costs make up 72.9% of the average couple’s joint income, but in other areas there is a very different story.

London, which has been the driving force behind massive house price inflation, also has the worst affordability issues, with the average upfront buying cost in the area of 112.1% of joint take home pay.  For these people, even getting an interest-only loan on a property seems an impossible dream.

The Halifax Building Society has said that in March house prices fell by 2.5%. This leaves buyers who took out 100% loans last year in danger of owning a house worse less than the money outstanding. In some cases first time buyers borrowed even more because of expected house price inflation. As soon as the credit crunch hit, most loan lenders stopped offering 100% mortgages, let alone the riskier 125% home loan, but many households are already signed up. If for any reason they face repossession, they could still owe money to their lender even after their house is sold.

Mform warned that people who took out 100% mortgages are at particular risk of falling into negative equity since the have no equity to cushion them if the value of their home drops by more than they have borrowed.

First time buyers who bought properties in the run up to summer 2007 and who took out 100% mortgages could see themselves owing more on their mortgage than their property is worth even if there is only a slight drop in property values.

However if you do have a 100% mortgage and there is a further drop in property values falling into negative equity should only become a real concern if you are looking to sell your house quickly. If property values do fall below the value of your outstanding loan then all you have to keep doing is making your monthly repayments like you had been before the price drop and you shouldn’t really have a problem. Basically you will have to ride out the storm.

Most experts are not expecting a house price crash but rather a slow gentle decline in house price inflation.

Also make sure you do your research and shop around as you might be a first time buyer who fits into the group that do not require a deposit but will still be considered as a strong candidate for a mortgage. Scottish Widows for example offers mortgages that are specifically geared towards university graduates who have just completed degrees in law or medicine.

Another way of increasing your chances of getting a loan is by finding a guarantor, such as your parents or another family member, to back you. Nationwide will accept guarantors across their whole range of standard mortgages while Scottish Widows offers a ‘top slice’ guarantor mortgage meaning that you can get your guarantor to top up your mortgage if it is not big enough to get the house you want. For instance if you are on a salary of £20,000 and want to purchase a property for £200,000 but can only borrow £100,000 then you can get your guarantor to guarantee the additional £100,000 depending on their income.

Net receipts for building societies nearly doubled in September when compared with 12 months before, shooting up by 181% to 2.8bn.

This figure is more than double the amount of money deposited in building societies last August and almost three times the amount deposited in September of 2006.

The last time there was a massive rise in savers depositing their money in building societies was back in October of 1986 when unsuccessful applicants for shares in TSB redeposited £1.9bn.

The main beneficiaries were savings accounts and cash ISAs. Cash ISA deposits increased almost a fifth to £68bn over the month. This was the result of anxious investors pulling their saving from Northern Rock and looking elsewhere to deposit their money according to the Building Societies Association (BSA).

It is believed that in the run on Northern Rock back at the beginning of September as much as £7bn was withdrawn. Bradford & Bingley has proved to be one of the main beneficiaries of Northern Rocks crises.

Building societies are claiming to have been implementing strategies to deal with the credit crises for some months now, reigning in on the number of loans they approve over the past 12 months as well as lending more responsibly. This is in contrast to the Bank of England which has been criticised for not acting fast enough on the impending credit crises.  Debt counsellors are warning that house repossessions are likely to rocket as people default on home loans and other debts.

So here is a bit of financial talk for you. Credit unions are financial co-operatives which are run and owned by their members. Get a group of friends together and pool your savings in order to offer low cost and flexible financial products to you and your friends. The group will grow beyond just a small circle of people you know and as more and more people join you can improve on the services and deals available.

It works because all members pool their money and save in a common fund. All the profits from the bank are used to offer low interest rate loans and currently the typical interest rate for loan repayments is roughly six percent.

The goal of a credit union is to pay a dividend on your savings once a year to anyone with positive balances in their credit union bank account. Some credit unions pay back as much as 8 percent but usually it’s around 2 or 3 percent. With the current interest rate being fairly high, this means that you could be earning around 4 or 5 percent.