Is this fair practice?

Scott135

Having received an exhortation from MBNA through the post to take advantage of their 0% interest promotion on balance transfers, I did my sums and decided to transfer a balance ensuring I would be just below my credit limit. Three days after doing so, it transpired that thanks to the admin charge applied to the account by MBNA, (which I had not taken into account) I had exceeded my credit limit of £10,000 by £90. The very morning I discovered this I called them and immediately paid an amount to bring it back below the limit.

Horror of horrors, I was then told that as I had gone over the limit (despite it being due to them applying an admin charge) I had breached the Banks Terms and Conditions and so the entire balance would attract the full interest rate for evermore. I appealed in writing to their Customer helpdesk who simply re-confirmed that as I had breached their T&C's the account could not revert to the Interest free promotion. So now I'm stuck with paying 17.5% interest on a £10k balance for going £90 over the limit for three days. Is that fair?

dhassen

I'm afraid it is fair practice this. You did breach their Ts & Cs unfortunatley

Lots of people have posted on here with similar things, but i've heard of many times where Virgin reinstate the 0% if you're nice on the phone and it's a first 'offence'. Bad luck if they didn't reinstate it....

Expensive lesson learned then. I've done some sums and can't see how you were able to go over? Unless you did 95% of credit limit, then 95% of what was left......? I've done the sums for that too (yes im a geek) and that would still leave about £3-4??

If you just did one BT, then I make 3% of £9500 being £285, which wouldn't have put you over.

Paul_J

To answer your original question, my opinion is no, it's not fair. Are they, however, entitled to do what they've done? Well, yes.
But, how did you complete the balance transfer transaction? If it was on the phone talking to a rep, why has a transaction which automatically attracts a fee been permitted if it becomes obvious that with the added fee, the credit limit will be exceeded? Thats the bit which sounds underhand and unfair to me.
Time to put pen to paper using nice words to talk 'em round.
Otherwise it's a 150 (ouch!) quid a month bashing from that interest.
Good luck.

Bismarck

Paul_J wrote: »

To answer your original question, my opinion is no, it's not fair. Are they, however, entitled to do what they've done? Well, yes.
But, how did you complete the balance transfer transaction? If it was on the phone talking to a rep, why has a transaction which automatically attracts a fee been permitted if it becomes obvious that with the added fee, the credit limit will be exceeded? Thats the bit which sounds underhand and unfair to me.
Time to put pen to paper using nice words to talk 'em round.
Otherwise it's a 150 (ouch!) quid a month bashing from that interest.
Good luck.

there's something odd here...my experience has been that they wouldn't allow you to exceed the the 95% limit so as to allow for the fee.

as you've not managed to get them to let you off, I think you need to transfer this double -quick because there are some nasty rate hikes in the MBNA repertoire and 17.5% could be the start of a worsening situation.....sorry I can't be much help other than to warn you that they could make it much worse.

normanmark

Did you do it online or over the telephone?

exel1966

Scott135 wrote: »

Having received an exhortation from MBNA through the post to take advantage of their 0% interest promotion on balance transfers, I did my sums and decided to transfer a balance ensuring I would be just below my credit limit. Three days after doing so, it transpired that thanks to the admin charge applied to the account by MBNA, (which I had not taken into account) I had exceeded my credit limit of £10,000 by £90. The very morning I discovered this I called them and immediately paid an amount to bring it back below the limit.

Horror of horrors, I was then told that as I had gone over the limit (despite it being due to them applying an admin charge) I had breached the Banks Terms and Conditions and so the entire balance would attract the full interest rate for evermore. I appealed in writing to their Customer helpdesk who simply re-confirmed that as I had breached their T&C's the account could not revert to the Interest free promotion. So now I'm stuck with paying 17.5% interest on a £10k balance for going £90 over the limit for three days. Is that fair?

Whether it's fair or not is subjective, but they can legally apply the charge and rescind your 0% introductory period for breaking the T&C's. They could also be culpable for allowing you to be put into that situation by permitting a 100% BT. I'm suprised they've done that if indeed they have.

I would call again, be polite and calm, explain the circumstances to someone senior (if possible) and you may well get the 0% period back again.

sicker

On my calculations taking into account a 3% transfer fee, the most in round figures that you could transfer would have been £9700 not to breech your limit. How much did you manage to transfer?