Went over limit!!

spender717

Hi all,
So not wanting to make excuses, but after a seriously stressful last year and stupidly racking up spending on my Sainsbury's card i ended up going over the limit by around £200 in early November. I genuinely, or should i say naively thought you can't go over you're limit! 
Anyway, when i logged on i paid the £200 overage. 
Ive been avoiding looking at my finances as was feeling pretty down. Yesterday i checked my direct debit and saw a massive payment to my card in December. 

I called them today and after investigation i was told that i had gone over my limit twice.
What had happened was, that even though i paid additional money in mid November to clear October's overage, there were more pending transactions in october that didn't clear until November that took me over again.
Also the reason was that the interest and over limit fee took me over too so in affect they were the reason for the second over limit in November. 
They said if it was just the once they'd waive the penalty of taking my 0% away but as it was twice they wouldn't, even though the second time was due to the interest etc i was accruing from losing my 0%.
I'm just frustrated with myself as I've never had this happen before. Also if I'd known about the pending charges etc i would have overpaid even more to make sure there was enough wriggle room.
On top of that, i paid off my loan with them early in December of 8k remaining on it, and had i realised about this whole credit card mess i may have just paid that off instead. But as i thought i still had the 0% on it i didnt.
Anyway, yes i know I'm an idiot!

I was hoping for some advice. Should i look at balance transfer cards? Or should i look at loans?
As after always having a spotless record i now have 2 blooming over limit marks on my credit file! 
I'm just worried about getting anything accepted with my now rubbish credit score.
I'm  going to appeal to the ombudsman but one, they are months behind in backlogs and two, they may just side with sainsbury's despite us being in the awful pandemic, but either way i want to stop paying this interest as i was planning on over paying my card now that i had paid off my loan.
Any helpful advice would very much be appreciated as i just feel like I'mback at square one!!

[Deleted User]

You can try for a BT card.  Your rubbish credit score won't be a problem, but the fact you've gone overlimit might.

Remember that it's always possible go overlimit, just as it's possible to break a speed limit - and sometimes even useful to be able to do - so you need to monitor your spending. 

eskbanker

spender717 said:

I'm  going to appeal to the ombudsman but one, they are months behind in backlogs and two, they may just side with sainsbury's despite us being in the awful pandemic

Unless there's something you're not sharing, Sainsbury's have done nothing wrong here, so it would be a major surprise if FOS sided with you - why would the pandemic make any difference to not monitoring your card account?

Carrot007

spender717 said:

Also if I'd known about the pending charges etc i would have overpaid even more to make sure there was enough wriggle room.

If only there was a way to know how much you had spent.

cymruchris

spender717 said:

Hi all,
So not wanting to make excuses, but after a seriously stressful last year and stupidly racking up spending on my Sainsbury's card i ended up going over the limit by around £200 in early November. I genuinely, or should i say naively thought you can't go over you're limit! 
Anyway, when i logged on i paid the £200 overage. 
Ive been avoiding looking at my finances as was feeling pretty down. Yesterday i checked my direct debit and saw a massive payment to my card in December. 

I called them today and after investigation i was told that i had gone over my limit twice.
What had happened was, that even though i paid additional money in mid November to clear October's overage, there were more pending transactions in october that didn't clear until November that took me over again.
Also the reason was that the interest and over limit fee took me over too so in affect they were the reason for the second over limit in November. 
They said if it was just the once they'd waive the penalty of taking my 0% away but as it was twice they wouldn't, even though the second time was due to the interest etc i was accruing from losing my 0%.
I'm just frustrated with myself as I've never had this happen before. Also if I'd known about the pending charges etc i would have overpaid even more to make sure there was enough wriggle room.
On top of that, i paid off my loan with them early in December of 8k remaining on it, and had i realised about this whole credit card mess i may have just paid that off instead. But as i thought i still had the 0% on it i didnt.
Anyway, yes i know I'm an idiot!

I was hoping for some advice. Should i look at balance transfer cards? Or should i look at loans?
As after always having a spotless record i now have 2 blooming over limit marks on my credit file! 
I'm just worried about getting anything accepted with my now rubbish credit score.
I'm  going to appeal to the ombudsman but one, they are months behind in backlogs and two, they may just side with sainsbury's despite us being in the awful pandemic, but either way i want to stop paying this interest as i was planning on over paying my card now that i had paid off my loan.
Any helpful advice would very much be appreciated as i just feel like I'mback at square one!!

Not wanting to make excuses - but have done so - and then want to appeal to the ombudsman? Honestly that's not going to go very far at all. The situation is what the situation is - you've made some errors, not paid enough attention, and it's bitten you on the backside.

Now that the reality is out of the way - what's best to do now? Focus on getting the debts down, keep a hawk-like track of what you're spending, linked in to watching those balances/transactions in the apps very closely.

You're not an idiot. But you have done a few daft things.

If you do have significant debts at the moment - and high utilisation of existing credit - you'll struggle to get a high limit zero percent balance transfer card in the current climate. (Not impossible - but unlikely). You could try eligibility checkers directly on credit card provider websites like MBNA (who will also give a provisional limit if successful before a full application is made so you can see if it's worth it).

Although Sainsburys was on 0 percent - what was your plan to pay it down before the deal ended? If there wasn't a plan - what's the plan now?

Do you have outgoings you can cut? Do you need netflix? Do you need that big sky package? Do you need the fastest fastest broadband? Do you need unlimited texts calls and data a month? Are there any areas you can begin to make some savings? How can you address that credit card balance as quickly as possible? Do you have any tech lying around that you dont use that you could sell? An old laptop? An old ipad? an old phone?

In terms of your recorded over-limits - I would think that only a grovelling apology letter might persuade them to remove them - but a trip to the ombudsman won't. They are however within their rights to keep them on file as it's a factual record of what happened (although I know this isn't what you want to hear).

Time is always a great healer - and assuming you don't fall into the trap again, keep up all your payments, things will get better.

Thrugelmir

spender717 said:

I'm  going to appeal to the ombudsman but one, they are months behind in backlogs and two, they may just side with sainsbury's despite us being in the awful pandemic, but either way i want to stop paying this interest as i was planning on over paying my card now that i had paid off my loan.

Don't bother. There's only one place that the blame lies. You need to fund a way to manage your personal finances better. That's the danger with credit cards spending is so easy. They suck you in and eventually trip you up. 

enthusiasticsaver

Ok you are now in a bit of a pickle as having lost the 0% deal you are unlikely to get another one at the moment as you will have rubbished your credit record by going over the limit twice. Do you have any savings left after paying off the loan? I suggest you cut back as much as possible to get the card balance down  and try for another 0% in a few months time. 

enthusiasticsaver

I would always recommend paying off credit cards before loans unless the loan was at a very high rate of interest as the credit card terms can be changed easier if you default and not usually in your favour.