Bank Charges Financial Hardship Disussion

blockbuster_2

i have a t/a account at natwest. i am being charged £35.00 for every direct debit, standing order and cheque that doesnt clear and if the cheque or dd is represented i get charged again. Bank charges excalated to over £1000 recently. i have written to natwest and they say that their charges are nothing to do with the case that is currently going through the court and the charges are contractual (sorry they may have said they were not contractual, whichever one meant that i still had to pay) can anyone help me with t/a business accounts? do the same rules apply or is the court action just for personal accounts?

natweststaffmember

blockbuster wrote: »

i have a t/a account at natwest. i am being charged £35.00 for every direct debit, standing order and cheque that doesnt clear and if the cheque or dd is represented i get charged again. Bank charges excalated to over £1000 recently. i have written to natwest and they say that their charges are nothing to do with the case that is currently going through the court and the charges are contractual (sorry they may have said they were not contractual, whichever one meant that i still had to pay) can anyone help me with t/a business accounts? do the same rules apply or is the court action just for personal accounts?

t/as accounts are still claimable the same way as personal account because the name is "Joe Bloggs t/as bloggs boots" for example.

papatwink

Hi all, I sent my first letter to HSBC on 12th December `08 asking for my bankcharges back for the last 6 years and got the standard reply telling me everything was on hold at the mo but they also sent me a booklet to fill in " Putting your Finances in order", and to go see my bank as they would do all they could to help. So i did as told and my bank said there was nothing they could do. I then sent the second letter demanding my bank charges back on 18th March, and also told them i wished to claim under financial hardship as i had been charged 750.00 charges since November `08 and true to form they sent another standard letter and another booklet to fill in, telling me to go to the bank as they would be able help. My question is....what should i do now? I have done all they have asked of me. Is the next step MCOL??

natweststaffmember

papatwink wrote: »

Hi all, I sent my first letter to HSBC on 12th December `08 asking for my bankcharges back for the last 6 years and got the standard reply telling me everything was on hold at the mo but they also sent me a booklet to fill in " Putting your Finances in order", and to go see my bank as they would do all they could to help. So i did as told and my bank said there was nothing they could do. I then sent the second letter demanding my bank charges back on 18th March, and also told them i wished to claim under financial hardship as i had been charged 750.00 charges since November `08 and true to form they sent another standard letter and another booklet to fill in, telling me to go to the bank as they would be able help. My question is....what should i do now? I have done all they have asked of me. Is the next step MCOL??

Fill in the form which I assume is an income and expenditure form and send it back to the department that sent you that booklet out in the post.

gimmeitback

gimmeitback wrote: »

Hello, this is my first post but i will try and keep it brief. I am falling further and further behind with my banks. I reclaimed from Lloyds £1000 but Barclays went to court and a stay was applied. The judge did say in court that although they could apply charges they cannot chase me for the money but i dont have this in writing so i am worried that i may not be able to uphold this if they come calling for it.

Now i am getting many charges everymonth so who do i speak to first with regards to making a claim under the hardship ruling?

Can someone help me please? Also, can i make a claim on my credit cards without paying the upfront court fee i had to pay for the bank claim?

Any help would be very much appreciated. Thanks

Can anybody help me with this then? I take it i will go to the bank and tell them i wish to claim under financial hardship but what about the up front court fee for claiming on credit cards?

thanks again.

esmerellda

You can make a claim on your credit card by writing to your credit card provider in the first instance. If they refuse after both letters, then if you want more than the difference between £12 and the charge back then you will need to enter a court claim. If you are in hardship and struggling then you should have a look at fee remission at the court - this is form EX160 which you can find on the https://www.hmcs.gov.uk website. Should be template letters somewhere on here.


With regards to your bank charges claim against barclays, what you need to do is write to the bank outlining your circumstances - listing priority debts and arrears - and asking for them to consider your complaint under the financial difficulty exemption of the FSA waiver. Quote your claim ref number just so they are aware you already have a claim in court, but the hardship doesnt go through the court process. It should result in them sending you an income and expenditure form to complete, which you should do as quickly as possible and attach copies of relevant arrears/debt demands and return to them by special delivery if you can manage it.

If they view you as in financial difficulty they may ask for return of cards, move you to a basic account and recommend cancelling DD's etc. The may also offer an INTERIM refund of your charges to help with any immediate crisis you may have. This offer will NOT be full and final and the court claim will still stand as is, when the test case is finally concluded in our favour, you will be refunded the rest and interest and court fees less this Interim amount.

Hope that helps.

gimmeitback

esmerellda wrote: »

You can make a claim on your credit card by writing to your credit card provider in the first instance. If they refuse after both letters, then if you want more than the difference between £12 and the charge back then you will need to enter a court claim. If you are in hardship and struggling then you should have a look at fee remission at the court - this is form EX160 which you can find on the website. Should be template letters somewhere on here.


With regards to your bank charges claim against barclays, what you need to do is write to the bank outlining your circumstances - listing priority debts and arrears - and asking for them to consider your complaint under the financial difficulty exemption of the FSA waiver. Quote your claim ref number just so they are aware you already have a claim in court, but the hardship doesnt go through the court process. It should result in them sending you an income and expenditure form to complete, which you should do as quickly as possible and attach copies of relevant arrears/debt demands and return to them by special delivery if you can manage it.

If they view you as in financial difficulty they may ask for return of cards, move you to a basic account and recommend cancelling DD's etc. The may also offer an INTERIM refund of your charges to help with any immediate crisis you may have. This offer will NOT be full and final and the court claim will still stand as is, when the test case is finally concluded in our favour, you will be refunded the rest and interest and court fees less this Interim amount.

Hope that helps.

Thats fantastic. Many thanks and ill get on to it now.

pink69princess

Hi Esmerellda
I received £4k redundancy pay from my job.
I have no arrears with my mortgage, 2nd charge mortgage or council tax etc, but they said I should have spent the money on keeping the roof above my head!
I withdrew a £2k cash amount to buy a new car as my hubby is a taxi driver and due to the local authority's regulations his car would have no longer been eligible to be used as a taxi as of July as it would be too old, so we had no option but to buy a new one.
I paid of approx £600 on my debit card to Jacobs Baliffs to cover some old bills that they were dealing with.
Approx £1000 went on my normal monthly bills which go from my account by direct debit every month.
And with no excuse the remaining £400 or so was "frittered"
Do you think I still have a vaild claim?!

deamonds

Hi Guys,
I had a HSBC Plus account which I opened up in september/october of last year.
I upgraded from my normal account & recieved a £300.00 overdraft. After months of going past my informal limit & incurring charges I got sick to death of it.
I then opened up an account with Barclay's and then intended to leave the HSBC account outstanding & pay it off gradually each month.
Now due to the fact I am in the process of trying to claim the charges back that I have recieved since opening the account, I find it ridiculous that I should pay them now just to have to wait to see if I can claim them back.
I am quite a stubborn man, however I am very resentful toward banks & they way they try & ruin peoples lives & I am prepared to argue to the death over these charges.
I have tried to come to an agreement, whereby the outstanding charges are waived and I will just pay off the outstanding balance.
Well, I have come to the conclusion that I will be doing this, regardless of what the bank says.
I will take this as far as possible, I want to basically pay off the outstanding and leave them to deal with the charges, after which I will close the account.
After seeing this site as a safe haven for many years I just wondered if anyone could help me out??
many thanks
Alex

Craggio

Hi,
about 3 months ago i decided to use a template letter from here to start the ball rolling with reclaiming my bank charges, as all my statements were online with Halifax i totalled up my charges from there to £1300. (outch!)

a week later i received a letter which seemed like it was their own template letter for dealing with these cases and basicly told me that my case was on hold. I then started to read about the financial hardship and to my joy i totalled up my bank charges for the past 12 months to £802 and decided to construct my own letter to send to halifax (ill put a copy of it below).

a few days later i received a response telling me Halifax has put my case forward to one of their specialists who will take up to 4 WEEKS to come to a decision on what to do next with my claim and if i hadnt heard from them in 4 weeks i should get back in contact with them.

So far its been 2 weeks and no word yet... fingers crossed ill get some money back, its been a right pain with all these charges!
Kudos to this site for all the information, its been a right help!

Heres a copy of the letter i made if anyone was interested:


Dear Sir or Madam,

Account numbers: ******** & ********

Following on from my previous letter sent on the 21st January 2009 detailing my default bank charges totalling to £1309.00, I request that you deal with my case now rather than once the test case has ended as I am currently experiencing financial difficulties due to regularly going beyond my overdraft limit. The FSA’s term of this type of financial hardship is as follows:

“Do you repeatedly exceed your credit card or overdraft limit without agreement (and, in this regard, where a complainant has incurred over £500 in unauthorised overdraft charges in the previous 12 months, which is to be treated as indicative of financial difficulty)?”

I have totalled my bank charges for the past 12 months to the sum of £802, thus deeming myself in financial hardship and the FSA waiver states that you should continue to deal with hardship cases.

I look forward for a full response to this letter within 14 days.

Yours faithfully,