Limit reached, money still in the account.

1. A money request you fulfilled

This is the one that confuses people most, because it does not feel like sending.

When someone sends you an Interac money request and you approve it, you have sent an e-Transfer. The money moves from you to them, so it counts against your sending limit in full. Approve a $3,000 request on an account with a $3,000 daily cap and you are done sending for the day.

Requests are easy to forget because they arrive framed as someone else's action. Check your recent activity for approved requests, not just transfers you started yourself.

2. A transfer that is still sitting unclaimed

At most Canadian banks the amount is committed when you send, not when the recipient deposits. A $2,000 transfer that has been waiting a week for someone to answer the security question is still holding $2,000 of your limit.

If you need that room back, cancel the pending transfer. The funds and the limit generally both release. Cancelling is free at most banks, though a few charge — BMO $5.00, CIBC $3.50, ATB $3.00.

The related trap: a transfer that expires after 30 days. Until it does, it keeps holding your limit.

3. The rolling window has not cleared

Almost nobody's e-Transfer limit resets at midnight, but almost everybody assumes it does.

Canadian banks use rolling windows, measured from each individual transfer. A transfer sent at 3:00 p.m. Monday stops counting against your 24-hour limit at 3:00 p.m. Tuesday — not at midnight, and not when the new calendar day begins.

ICICI Bank Canada states this explicitly: send $10,000 at 10:00 a.m. and the next transfer is possible from 10:01 a.m. the following day. TD applies the same logic to its 7-day and 30-day windows.

So a series of transfers across a week can leave your weekly limit exhausted even though you sent nothing today. The practical fix is to look up the timestamp of your earliest recent transfer and count forward.

4. You are looking at the wrong limit

Banks maintain several separate limit categories, and raising one does nothing to the others. RBC files e-Transfers under "Third Party Payments", which is a different bucket from debit card point-of-sale purchases.

People find the limit settings in online banking, raise something, and are surprised nothing changed — because the adjustable sliders there usually control ATM withdrawals and in-store purchases, not e-Transfers.

5. You hit a count cap, not a dollar cap

A few institutions limit how many transfers you send rather than how much. Neo allows 50 outgoing e-Transfers per calendar month whatever the amounts.

This one is genuinely confusing when you hit it, because every dollar figure still looks fine. Unlike the rolling dollar windows, the count resets on the 1st of the month.

How to work out which one it is

1. Open the send screen in your banking app. Most banks display your remaining limit for the current window right there. That number is authoritative.
2. Read your recent activity for the last 30 days, including approved money requests, and note the timestamps — not just the dates.
3. Look for pending transfers that have not been claimed. Those are recoverable immediately.
4. Add up the trailing 24 hours, 7 days and 30 days separately. One of them will be at its ceiling.
5. If none of that explains it, call your bank. A fraud hold or a restriction on a newer account can suppress limits without an obvious reason, and only support can see it.

If you need to send it now

• Cancel an unclaimed transfer to free that amount immediately — the fastest option when it applies.
• Send a partial amount up to your remaining limit and the balance when the window clears.
• Ask the recipient to send a request if their bank allows a larger fulfilment than your send cap — occasionally the limits differ.
• Use a different rail. A wire transfer or bill payment is not subject to your e-Transfer limit. See how to send more than your e-Transfer limit.
• Check whether yours can be raised. Wealthsimple lets you do it in-app in seconds; credit unions often adjust on request; RBC does not raise limits at all.

Related guides

• Why was my e-Transfer declined?
• Why is my e-Transfer pending?
• Interac e-Transfer limits by bank
• Business e-Transfer limits by bank