OVERlimit Charge WTF?!?!?

[akumaslair]

ive had a few different cards over the years, and I have just about paid off the FULL balance each month, the current Comm MC Platinum I have had it for about 2 years and have paid it off fully,

I have at times also gone over the limit, so if my limit was $500, then there are times, maybe the first time on this card, that I have spent $600 on it..

I got charged a $35.00 overlimit charge.....

is this justified??? i dont recall ever being charged an overlimit charged on any of the other cards ive had.....

PEEVED!!!!

 

[Nutcase]

Overlimit charges are now applied to most cards in the market including AMEX credit cards and the much touted citibank gold.

Refer to the "financial table" that you received with your card and it will be disclosed therein.

Nothing cloak and dagger in this.

I suggest that you increase your limit if you are maxing out your card or use an AMEX charge card or Diners Club.

If I were you, I would call Commbank and speak with someone and request the fee to be waived. The more relationship footings that you have, the stronger your case will be. Be prepared to walk if the insist on the fee.

 

[opusman]

Oh for the good old days when a limit was actually a limit and attempts to go over it would just be outright declined

 

[Nutcase]

Oh for the good old days when a limit was actually a limit and attempts to go over it would just be outright declined

Good Point. The banks position on this is that they want to save you the embarrassment of having your transactions declined. It is the same rationale they use for honor fees on transaction accounts. This is the fee they charge for honoring a transaction when you have insufficient funds in your account. Ironically you cant win because if they dishonor the transaction (ie insufficient funds) you pay for that too.

Of course, its really just revenue raising.

Once again, Increase your limit and monitor your transactions online.

 

[oz_mark]

Oh for the good old days when a limit was actually a limit and attempts to go over it would just be outright declined

ANZ do have a facility where you can opt-out of going over the limit (although there are still cases where you could go over the limit).

There is a private members bill making its way through the system that would limit the fee to a pre-estimated cost of how much it actually costs the bank to go over your limit. It was at a senate inquiry phase, and who knows if anything will actually become of it.

 

[straitman]

ive had a few different cards over the years, and I have just about paid off the FULL balance each month, the current Comm MC Platinum I have had it for about 2 years and have paid it off fully,

I have at times also gone over the limit, so if my limit was $500, then there are times, maybe the first time on this card, that I have spent $600 on it..

I got charged a $35.00 overlimit charge.....

is this justified??? i dont recall ever being charged an overlimit charged on any of the other cards ive had.....

PEEVED!!!!

akumaslair,

Suggest you look at this site. Don't know how successful (or otherwise) they are though. It may be worth a try.

BANKBEATERS

 

[Travel Guru]

Im pretty sure one of the current affair shows featured them a while back.

From what they were saying, a bank cant charge a fee that is outrageously higher than the cost to the business based on the extra work produced by you going over the limit.

Having said that, I can't be bothered fighting it, the stress and time arent justified.

TG

 

[simongr]

Hmm - wonder how someone going over their limit costs the bank money... they earn money o the transaction and earn interest on a higher due amount (unless paid in full by the due date of course).

I assume that they would base their calculation on the rationale that the limit represents their acceptable level of risk to minimise defaults and that people going over their limit increases defaults and thus incurs costs.

Given that the entire process would be automated the direct cost of going over the limit should be small...

 

[oz_mark]

Im pretty sure one of the current affair shows featured them a while back.

From what they were saying, a bank cant charge a fee that is outrageously higher than the cost to the business based on the extra work produced by you going over the limit.

Having said that, I can't be bothered fighting it, the stress and time arent justified.

This is pretty much how the banks get away with it, people can't be bothered. However, when they raised the fees from around the $20 level to the $35 level it seems that this raised the hackles of some (and for some it probably is worth pursuing).

 

[oz_mark]

Hmm - wonder how someone going over their limit costs the bank money... they earn money o the transaction and earn interest on a higher due amount (unless paid in full by the due date of course).

I assume that they would base their calculation on the rationale that the limit represents their acceptable level of risk to minimise defaults and that people going over their limit increases defaults and thus incurs costs.

Given that the entire process would be automated the direct cost of going over the limit should be small...

and it is argued that they should be only entitled to recover their costs of the 'wrong' of going overlimit.

 

[Schebesta]

I totally agree, I have copped $35 charges from my Westpac card 5 times this year. It hurt me the most when I got married because I had to keep paying for things and needed the credit badly.

The worst thing is that I have conflicted interests because I own bank shares although dont want to pay fees...

 

[Nutcase]

I totally agree, I have copped $35 charges from my Westpac card 5 times this year. It hurt me the most when I got married because I had to keep paying for things and needed the credit badly.

The worst thing is that I have conflicted interests because I own bank shares although dont want to pay fees...

Conflicted interests?

I don't think that your $175 contribution to Westpac's bottom line is going to make much difference to their share price.

 

[albatross710]

This is one of my favourite topics. The English banking sector has had to address this problem as it was shown in court that the bank overdrawn (overlimit) fees were illegal. The UK banks are now refunding up to 6 years overdraft fees.

The issue is that the amount of the liquidated damage (ie the $35 fee) is more than the damage caused to the bank. In the old days a bank manager actually incurred costs by taking the time to contact the customer and sort out the problem. These days they don't even know about it, just rack it up in "overnight processing".

Westpac is the bank I use and I call them regularly whenever they try on one of these fees. They know they are illegal. They know exactly what has happened in the UK. Westpac execs have sleepless nights hoping Australians don't wake up.

We need to agitate in Australia to make it happen here.

As it turned out I was 1 hour late with a BPay payment to the Westpac earth+ card earlier this year. Westpac duely imposed a $35 fee. A phone call to their call centre, discussing the above bank fee melt down scenario resulted in:

MISSED PAYMENT CHARGE REVERSAL 35.00-
000000000000000

They do of course give the story that it is in the "Terms and Charges" which were accepted. Agreed but we don't have any choice in accepting them. The point in the UK was that the Condition itself was struck out.

So firstly everyone needs to dispute each and every "overdrawn" and overdraft fee.

Even if successful lodge a complaint through the banks complaints process to start getting the message through to the executives.

The other thing that gets me is that with Westpac I have 6 different accounts yet they treat each account as a seperate place to put their snout. At the time of incurring this fee, across all 6 accounts I had a better net position than the previous day. It was just one account. One day banks really will look at the total value of the client and not how many fees they can gouge.

Some web reading:

http://www.banking-guide.org.uk/reclaiming-fees.html
U.K. regulator wins court case on bank fees regulation - MarketWatch

Don't let this one get away.

 

[albatross710]

your $175 contribution to Westpac's bottom line is going to make much difference to their share price.

Agreed that the action of 1 will not make a dent. The actions of many people can make a difference.

I think banks rely heavily on consumer latency. It is painful to have to change banks and getting harder with more direct credits and direct debits. They know that we will accept a lot of pain before actually switching, actually it is the banks "establishment fees" that also stop us from changing banks, staying put and copping the fees.

 

[Travel Guru]

I suggest you take a look at this info.

CHOICE - Bank fees

It outlines why the fees aren't legally enforcable, and provides a template letter to send to your bank.

I've typed one up today to send off, ive had enough of these A******S ripping people off with excessive fees, so decided i will do something about it after all.

Hope it helps

TG

 

[Bundy Bear]

I got one of those overlimit charges about 2 months ago; at least I am not the only 1 to max out the credit card.

 

[albatross710]

Ioverlimit charges about 2 months ago.

It is worth discussing it with your bank and hitting them up for a refund even thought it has been a couple of billing cycles They know they are on shakey ground.

 

[Travel Guru]

It is worth discussing it with your bank and hitting them up for a refund even thought it has been a couple of billing cycles They know they are on shakey ground.

I've got them dating back to last year which im going to claim back, and if they don't im quite prepared to take it further.

From what i've read, you can actually submit a claim for up too 6 or 7 yrs after the charge was imposed.

The more people who stand up to this, the quicker it will be before the banks change their behaviour

TG

 

[oz_mark]

I suggest you take a look at this info.

CHOICE - Bank fees

It outlines why the fees aren't legally enforcable, and provides a template letter to send to your bank.

I've typed one up today to send off, ive had enough of these A******S ripping people off with excessive fees, so decided i will do something about it after all.

Hope it helps

TG

I don't remember the exact fee (might have been a late payment fee for paying a day late), but my parents fired one of these letters ogg, and got a refund.

I tried it with GE Money and they just sent me the Terms and Conditions!

 

[JohnK]

I think I have been hit with a late payment fee on every credit card at one time or another.

Time to look through past statements. I am almost certain I have most credit card statements for the last 7-8 years. It would be interesting to see if anything eventuates....