Lloyds TSB raise your credit limit then your interest rate!

pepsimiddleton

This has to stop when are credit card companies going to start taking responsibility for getting people into more debt.

I have 3 credit cards and as I am not working am trying to pay them off bit by bit. I have had all 3 card companies raise my credit limit without asking me even though it is obvious I am not paying much off.

Then today I get a letter from Lloyds telling me that as my financial circumstances have changed they are INCREASING my APR by 4% to 23.45%

I have just called them and blasted the poor guy on the phone. How is raising my interest rate going to help them get their money back???? I pay 100% more than my minimum payment each month and the only late payment charges I've had have been because of stupid bank holiday and the cash payment accounting a day late which I've rang and had the charges reversed and I mistakenly went over my limit once. This apparently makes me a bad payer and I must therefore have my interest rate increased. It beggars belief.

Luckily I have had it put back to the old rate, but how many other people won't phone and challenge it.

I am so mad, as you can tell :rotfl:

Curr946

The CCs will give you 30 days notice of any new raise in both rates and limits. You can rejected the rise in limit by calling (or in the case on HBOS, sign a form). You can also request that they never offer a rise in your limit unless you request it.

Re your rates, if your rate is increased you can decline this and have the account closed for new transactions. Then you juts pay you monthly payment until cleared.

Now, as for your comment "This has to stop when are credit card companies going to start taking responsibility for getting people into more debt.".....
My response: when are customers going take responsibility for their own foolish spending?

MonkeyMad

pepsimiddleton wrote: »

This has to stop when are credit card companies going to start taking responsibility for getting people into more debt.

How much are you taking? Your statements make me wonder

pepsimiddleton wrote: »

I have 3 credit cards and as I am not working am trying to pay them off bit by bit. I have had all 3 card companies raise my credit limit without asking me even though it is obvious I am not paying much off.

A raised credit limit shouldn't be a problem unless it prevents you getting more specialised credit elsewhere in which case you can ask to have them lowered. They are not targets to aim for, so you should merely see more headroom between your limit and what you owe.

pepsimiddleton wrote: »

the only late payment charges I've had have been because of stupid bank holiday and the cash payment accounting a day late ..... This apparently makes me a bad payer and I must therefore have my interest rate increased. It beggars belief.

It's so annoying when you get that bill with about three weeks to pay and the pesky Bank Holiday that has been known about for an entire year gets in the way. Why don't the credit card companies realise their customers can't trouble themselves with the triviality of paying on time?


Epic Fail

thenudeone

pepsimiddleton wrote: »

This has to stop when are credit card companies going to start taking responsibility for getting people into more debt.

This has got to stop. When are people going to take responsibility for deciding whether they can afford the repayments before they buy something, then trying to pass the blame on to everyone else instead of accepting that they should have had more control [the bank didn't spend the money - they did].

geoffky

When are people going to take responsibility for their own actions..You are grown adults who little children look up to and if they really knew they would laugh at you..stop spending what you can not afford... simple really


DEBIT CARDS!!!

YorkshireBoy

pepsimiddleton wrote: »

even though it is obvious I am not paying much off.

The minimum payment on LTSB is 1% + interest, so around 2.7% (at around 18.9% APR).

You say "I pay 100% more than my minimum payment each month", which I take to mean you're repaying 5.4% of your balance each month. After interest, your debt is therefore reducing by around 3.7% per month...or circa 44% per annum. Good news...it'll be cleared in around 2 years.

Unless of course you're still using it?

So to me it's not obvious at all that you're "not paying much off", so I suspect LTSB will feel the same.

Then today I get a letter from Lloyds telling me that...they are INCREASING my APR by 4% to 23.45%

I think you mean they wanted to increase your rate by 4 percentage points?...because 4% would be a very, very, small increase indeed (4% of circa 18.9% APR being around 0.75%).

I have just called them and blasted the poor guy on the phone. How is raising my interest rate going to help them get their money back????

It's very simple really...if they think there's a danger their capital is at risk, they'll try to make it back on revenue instead.

and the only late payment charges I've had have been because of stupid bank holiday

I'll leave others to comment on this petulant statement!

and I mistakenly went over my limit once. This apparently makes me a bad payer and I must therefore have my interest rate increased. It beggars belief.

Not to me it doesn't!

BugsyBrowne

Going slightly over your credit limit is not half as bad as a late/missed payment.

opinions4u

pepsimiddleton wrote: »

This has to stop when are credit card companies going to start taking responsibility for getting people into more debt.

Banks exist to take deposits from people and lend that money onto others at a profit. Those who want debt can have it if the bank thinks they'll repay at some point in the future.

But a credit card limit is not a spending target. It is an optional borrowing facility. Until a couple of years ago I had credit cards with limits totalling £125,000. I never carried a balance on any of them after the payment due date.

I have 3 credit cards and as I am not working am trying to pay them off bit by bit. I have had all 3 card companies raise my credit limit without asking me even though it is obvious I am not paying much off.

You don't have to use those limits. You can even reject the increase in limit if you like. It's your decision if you choose to use it. You don't have to.

Then today I get a letter from Lloyds telling me that as my financial circumstances have changed they are INCREASING my APR by 4% to 23.45%

A variable interest rate agreement can vary an interest rate.

I have just called them and blasted the poor guy on the phone

Pathetic. Unless you were speaking to the person who makes the pricing decisions. Do you shout at checkout operators in the supermarket when the store puts the price of sugar up?

How is raising my interest rate going to help them get their money back???

Well it will mean they make more profits while they wait.

I pay 100% more than my minimum payment each month and the only late payment charges I've had have been because of stupid bank holiday and the cash payment accounting a day late which I've rang and had the charges reversed and I mistakenly went over my limit once.

Bank holidays are announced several years in advance. They are not stupid. I quite enjoy them.

This apparently makes me a bad payer and I must therefore have my interest rate increased. It beggars belief.

Well you're a worse payer than most credit card customers. You might not like to hear it, but it's a fact.

Luckily I have had it put back to the old rate, but how many other people won't phone and challenge it.

So the big bad bank aren't charging you any extra then.

MonkeyMad

Is it National Day of the Tool today?

giblet10

How do Lloyds know your financial circumstances have changed? Did you tell them you weren't working right now?

YorkshireBoy

giblet10 wrote: »

How do Lloyds know your financial circumstances have changed?

Maybe OP's salary used to be paid into a LTSB current account and they've noticed it's stopped and been replaced with a one-off redundancy payment credit?

But, and I suspect this is the real reason, LTSB (along with all banks) take a monthly feed from the CRAs which includes indebtedness data*. I suspect OP has been racking up spend on their cards during the period of unemployment and this has been reported to LTSB via the aforementioned monthly feed, along with the late payments and overlimit breaches.

* This 'indebtedness' data (and, especially, potential indebtedness data, in the form of credit limits held elsewhere) is the reason LTSB won't extend me a guaranteed credit card at the moment (according to a branch advisor when we were looking at my profile...which is 1D, which I was told means excellent customer but only good enough for 4th best APR rate).