Which of the following lenders is likely to give the highest limit?

Alex9384

Do Virgin and M&S use the same underwriter?

I was "pre-approved" for both on the 1st Feb when I did eligibility checks on their own websites, then I proceeded to applications on the same day, nothing happened until today 4th Feb, when they both sent me emails less than 1 hour apart, both saying that I was declined.

martinbainbridge1975

would avoid M&S - not generous with limits at all

Alex9384

martinbainbridge1975 said:

would avoid M&S - not generous with limits at all

Too late. They also seem a bit clueless, unable to recognize what would be a good reliable customer to them. An immaculate credit record didn't help, I bet they got scared of my CC debt, still on promotional rates, which is the reason why people apply for balance transfer and how banks make money... That's probably too much thinking for them.

MrFrugalFever

Marchitiello is correct about the credit reporting not being completely live, lenders can’t always see all information live.

It sounds like you’ve now made multiple applications with several lenders which would result in a number of hard searches. I would resist any further searches for the next 6 months.

When does your next 0% rate end?

In my experience, Barclaycard have been the most generous of late (2021 they cut right back and slashed a lot of peoples limits) but seems to be on the increase again. 

From what I gather, your levels of income and disposable income has a big part to play in the limit you receive, a relative who is on a very low salary got a £400 limit last month. I got £11k.

martinbainbridge1975

MrFrugalFever said:

Marchitiello is correct about the credit reporting not being completely live, lenders can’t always see all information live.

It sounds like you’ve now made multiple applications with several lenders which would result in a number of hard searches. I would resist any further searches for the next 6 months.

When does your next 0% rate end?

In my experience, Barclaycard have been the most generous of late (2021 they cut right back and slashed a lot of peoples limits) but seems to be on the increase again. 

From what I gather, your levels of income and disposable income has a big part to play in the limit you receive, a relative who is on a very low salary got a £400 limit last month. I got £11k.

would agree on Barclaycard but even they have cut back, I recently went back to them as a new customer, got £6500 limit.  going back a few years when I had a considerable chunk of card debt they gave me £12500 limit when I had no accounts with them

Alex9384

MrFrugalFever said:

It sounds like you’ve now made multiple applications with several lenders which would result in a number of hard searches. I would resist any further searches for the next 6 months.

When does your next 0% rate end?

Barclaycard £4200 until 1 March 23

Lloyds Platinum £4200 until 2 May 23

It's either 2 or 4 hard searches, depending on whether my 2 attempts for Sainsbury's card triggered hard searches or not. Both applications crashed at the final step after clicking the Submit button without showing me the result. I tried 2 different browsers. I rang up their customer service and the guy said he can't see any application from me and that if there are hard searches, they will remove them for me... But it will take weeks until I find out. During that time there might be 4 hard searches on my files.

MrFrugalFever

Are your CC’s at their limits (or close to)?

Barclaycard are frequently offering BT and MT offers, if you have one could you not utilise that?

When I have done full applications, I’ve seen the hard searches appear within days, not weeks!

Alex9384

MrFrugalFever said:

Are your CC’s at their limits (or close to)?

Barclaycard are frequently offering BT and MT offers, if you have one could you not utilise that?

When I have done full applications, I’ve seen the hard searches appear within days, not weeks!

No, none is at the limit.

Lloyds was at the limit at £7960 when the credit limit was £8000, because I bought a car with the card and even paid insurance, etc. with the same card. But that was at the end of 2021. The balance has been steadily going down and the credit limit went up to 10k, so less than 50% utilisation for the last few months. I typed in a new credit limit of 12.000 as I just wanted to see how much they would approve. If you try to increase Lloyds/Halifax limit and you ask for too much, they will simply tell you how much they can offer you instead. I didn't expect 12k to be accepted, I just typed in the number and wanted to see how much they would give me instead. But to my surprise, 12k went through so that's my new credit limit on the Lloyds CC.
 
Closest to the limit is the Barclaycard with £4200 balance and £7250 limit, that's around 58% utilisation right now. The limit was £8200 but they reduced it as they got scared of the high utilisation last year, so they decided to take the utilisation even higher by reducing the limit, so they can get scared even more. I know, I know, but that's their "logic". Since then, they keep declining my limit increase requests, but after the last statement a new offer popped up. One purchase offer, but only 7 months 0% and one BT with 2.9% fee and 0% until Nov 2024. Maybe I'll take that one later on.

I will need to pay off Barclaycard from my savings which I wanted to avoid. But I'm also curious if they'll finally approve a higher credit limit after I pay the balance off. Maybe I'll be waiting for a new money transfer. It might be worth it if the fee is lower than some savings rates.

Marchitiello

Alex9384 said:

martinbainbridge1975 said:

would avoid M&S - not generous with limits at all

Too late. They also seem a bit clueless, unable to recognize what would be a good reliable customer to them. An immaculate credit record didn't help, I bet they got scared of my CC debt, still on promotional rates, which is the reason why people apply for balance transfer and how banks make money... That's probably too much thinking for them.

Most banks will be “worried” about high debts on promotional or otherwise (again in my experience underwriters could not immediately recognise this) as they cannot see saving and/or bank balances do if you earn £35k pa and have £20k unsecured debts (plus other factors such as mortgage, other secured loans, etc) they would probably not offer any further credit line, not unique to M&S (I have actually recently got a card from them (I am an existing HSBC customer though, with high credit lines) and I got a £10k limit from the get go used up to the max available to balance transfer my rolling stoozing balance