Do Santander owe me?

RobMoney

Hi,

First post, so please excuse if this has been answered before.

Anyway, I have a Santander zero credit card, with a £2000 limit.

My balance is currently at -£317.09 and it says credit available £2317.91

What exactly does this mean? Does it mean I've overpaid by £317 ish and if I spend this using my card I owe nothing?

This card has been like this for years due to previous debt, I paid it off and wanted to avoid the credit card for a while! But since looking back, it's got me wondering.

Also Santander have been sending me statements every month which read something like -91p but never asks me to pay anything. Have I been getting interest from them?

Just wondered if anyone else was in a similar position before as it's not quite clear what is going on. If they are paying me interest, it would be nice to keep them in my debt in a ironic twist of fate As that's more than what my bank is currently paying.

sharpy2010

At first glance it would appear that they owe you £317.09, but you have to consider why is that excess balance there. If you were not expecting it, then its highly unlikely you actually have overpaid, and you'd do good to leave it there a while and see what happens to it.

If its still there in a month or two, consider spending it.

RobMoney

That's the thing, it's already been there a while (2 years maybe). So it's definitely available and (hopefully) not a system glitch.

sharpy2010

Two years? Well the statute of limitation that they could ask for it back is 6 years, but if its still there having been there for two years, I'd be taking my chances and spending it.

But spend it on the card, don't phone and ask for a cheque, just in case it brings something to their attention ;-)

zerog

Yeah I would just buy my weekly shop on it until it goes just under 0, then pay the few pounds off. You might as well keep the card since it won't hurt your credit rating. However, I recall that the Zero CCard charges you £10 if you don't spend anything on it for 6 months.

RobMoney

zerog wrote: »

I recall that the Zero CCard charges you £10 if you don't spend anything on it for 6 months.

I just googled that and couldn't find that anywhere. Where did you hear it from?

I'll use the card for something minor and see what happens I guess :money:

zerog

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1778943

hmm, but the post there says it only applies if the balance is 0, which yours isn't!