Sainsbury's, Virgin(MBNA) and Barclaycard reduced limits in one week

runningman100

Its my first post but I'm a bit of a lurker on here so am pretty much up to speed with all of the tricks the CC companies get up to in trying to lure money out of you, and have notched up 12 credit cards over the years as I never keep a balance past its offer period.

I just thought I'd give a heads up to people with Sainsburys, Virgin and Barclaycards as I've had my limits on all 3 have reduced in the past week without yet recieving a letter from any of the companies informing me of this.

The worst was Virgin (£1900 down to £200) - I'd just paid off the balance in full after the end of 9 months 0%. I've had a total of 30 months at 0% on this card (the first was a 12 month introductory offer, I paid it off in full after 12 months and they then offered me another 9 months at 0% twice) so I'm not really surprised they have deemed me a bad customer.

Next was Sainsbury's who I'm holding £2300 with at 5.9% for the life of the balance, they reduced my limit from £2700 to £2400 - again they probably view me as a 'bad customer' as I'm not spending on top of the BT rate.

Finally Barclaycard reduced me from £1200 to £950. Again I am holding about £900 at 5.9% life of balance and not spending on top of this so they probably dislike me as a customer.

I've never missed a payment and always pay my cards in full once the offer is over, and even though I would not use the credit thats been withdrawn its not a nice feeling when you check online and get a surprise.

Nice to finally have sign up and join in;)

Bismarck

Sorry to hear of the triple whammy...communication is fantastic isn't it?

Don't get the Barclaycard bit...you'd think they'd like the LOB bit as being a nice regular earner, wouldn't you?

Purple_Peril

Sorry to hear this - but having read some of the other threads, at least they have kept your limit above your balance. I know it's not much consolation, but some posters in other threads have had limits reduced below their current balance.

I've recently taken out a Virgin cc, to get the 0% to pay for my new kitchen (using cc cheques, then I get the 15 months). The rest of it will be paid on my new Capital One card (4% cashback) and then transferred to my new Barclaycard (0% on BTs for 14 months) to get the cc protection.

Bismarck

who have been the worst culprits for reducing the limit to below the outstanding balance? it's getting hard to keep track nowadays!

youknowwho

I think that they are well within their right to reduce your limits. Like you just said, you have 12 CC's!! thats quite a few, and what doe sthe total of all the credit limits add up to? 20-30 thousand?? Thats howmuch debt your could potentially get urself in. So the company's that have reduced your limit are taking responsibility and reducing their risk to loss. Im sure the banks is the first place you wouyld point the finger if you were to get urself into financial trouble?!

And as for them telling you about reducing the limit, well their not going to tell you in advance are they, you could then go and max out the card and then they could lose their money.

The banks have taken responsilbilty for how much potential debt you are exposedto, if you want to make these decisions yourself then you need to be closing at least 9 of these cards down. Ring round them all, and check which one will give you the lowest rates, once you have done that, go round closing the crap ones.

UK007BullDog

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=735809

You have 12 cards and you are a risk to the banks. So with the CC scare in action in the USA we are here now led to lower limits to reduce their risks.

CannyJock

Any reason why you haven't cancelled off any of the 12 cards that you don't use any more?

General advice elsewhere in the forums is to cancel these when an introductory offers runs out after doing a balance transfer to another card.

Card companies are seeing you sitting there with 12 cards, they add up your total available credit and make a risk assessment by the sounds of it.

runningman100

CannyJock wrote: »

Any reason why you haven't cancelled off any of the 12 cards that you don't use any more?

General advice elsewhere in the forums is to cancel these when an introductory offers runs out after doing a balance transfer to another card.

Card companies are seeing you sitting there with 12 cards, they add up your total available credit and make a risk assessment by the sounds of it.

I have kept them all going simply because up until now they have all (except egg which I now use as my weekly spend card) continued to offer me reduced rates within a couple of months of the introductory period, for example Virgin offered me 9 months twice after the first 12 months, Halifax have periodically offered me 4.9% life of balance, ect.

I agree with what you say about responsible lending though, I really find it hard to believe that the CC companies just kept accepting me for card offers without any proof of income or regard for the stash of cards I was holding.

If I ran the cards to their limits they'd notch up just over £36k, which considering I'm not even 3 years out of uni is pretty reckless lending as I see it.

I consider myself pretty responsible, and have used most of the offers to invest into a small business which I started and to cover any shortfalls in my expenses while the business gets going (which thankfully it now is, fingers crossed the economy stays in good shape) but it would have been very easy to get into a situation where even the minimum payment was a struggle to repay and then get stung after the offer finishes on super high interest.

Your right though, I should cancel the zero balance cards, in fact I think thats going to be my job for tomorrow now;)

Bismarck

I'm actually with RunningMan...ok I admit I've got a fair few cards myself but they do keep coming up with offers that are worth using and they see me as a good risk...if I closed some down and needed to tart, I'd have to apply fresh and there are no guarantees of acceptance, are there? The worst thing for me would be to sit there and take whatever the CC gives me as it knows I'm unable to shift a balance anywhere...

battyboimatt

Well im glad to see Im not the only one who Barclaycard have slashed the credit limit on, I checked my online account today to the shock to see it was now at £300 limit, my god,I only phoned them to cancel in Jan and they offered me a good deal to stay and upped my limit, now it seems they just wanted to slash it to even less than I had before I phoned to cancel

Bismarck

Well keeping quiet on the Barclaycard front....had a small cut on my limit last year from a high level to a not-quite-so-high level...still plenty...with the usual stuff about don't appeal etc....fair play...wasn't going to....then this week they increase it to way over what it used to be...guess I'm in their preferred ranks on a long haul LOB....