You were surprised to see a negative balance on your credit card just when you were expecting a $0 balance. Here’s a newsflash – it wasn’t probably a rogue negative sign or typo on your bill. Yes, you are in that very rare situation where your credit card company is the one who owes you money.
How Does a Negative Balance on Credit Card Occur?
A negative balance on a credit card is not some kind of trickery. This actually means that your credit card issuer owes you money this time. There are several ways for this to happen:
- You returned something that you purchased with your card.
Maybe you used your credit card to buy an item and paid off your balance right away. But, you end up returning the product after changing your mind or you discovered a fault with it. Since the balance is already paid off, the return will hit your card, resulting to a negative balance.
- You made an overpayment with your bill.
A very common cause of negative balance on credit card is paying more than what you owe. If you pay online using the website of the credit card, the issuer will stop you from paying more than your balance.
But, if you wrote a check or you paid using the online bill pay of your bank account, your credit card issue will accept your overpayment, with the overage posted on your statement as a negative balance.
- You cashed out a lot of rewards.
If you are using a cashback rewards card and you want to use your rewards as statement, it is possible to mistakenly apply a lot of rewards to your balance. The miscalculation creates a negative balance on your credit card, similar to overpaying your credit card using a check.
What to Do If You Have Negative Balance on Credit Card?
While your credit card issuer got your extra money, they won’t hang on to that and not give it back to you. You can still get your cashback in one way or another yet the method that you receive your money is all up to you.
Below are a few common ways for getting your cashback:
1. Wait it out.
Your credit card issuer will never keep the hard-earned money that you don’t even owe them in the first place. If there is a negative balance on your card, sit back, relax, and wait for your issuer to handle it.
2. Request for a credit balance refund.
To speed up the process of getting back your money, contact the customer service of your credit card company to ask for a refund. You got a few refund options here such as a check or direct bank account deposit.
3. Use your credit card.
Finally, you can pretty much consider the negative balance on your card as cash. Don’t wait to receive your check via mail and just use your card for your future purchases to go back to a zero balance.