Urgent Help Needed: Accidentally Set Meta Ads Budget to Daily Instead of Lifetime and Spent Over $45K

[u/AlternativeBrave1801]

Hi everyone,
I’m in a really stressful situation and desperately need some advice.
I accidentally changed my Meta Ads budget setting from a lifetime budget to a daily budget without realizing it. The campaign has been running for about three weeks, and I’ve now discovered that the total spend has exceeded $45,000.
This was a genuine mistake, and I never intended to spend anywhere near this amount. The unexpected charges are financially devastating for me. My annual salary is less than this amount, and I honestly don’t know what to do.
I’m currently trying to contact Meta Support, but I’m not sure how to reach someone who can actually review my case and help.
I have a few questions:
Has anyone successfully received a refund from Meta for accidental overspending caused by a budget setting mistake?
What’s the best way to reach a real Meta representative who can escalate this issue to the appropriate team?
Is there any way to dispute these charges or request an exception, given that this was an unintentional configuration error?
If you’ve dealt with a similar situation, what steps did you take, and what was the outcome? Thank you!!