Nat west charge my 15 year old daughter £40 for refusing to pay a £27.00 DD

lisssa

Hi

hope someone can help me.....

my daughter has had a nat west bank account for about a year now, basically her dad and I pay in weekly amounts of money which she uses as her 'allowance' and she buys all her own clothes,and pays for her day to day expenses - going out etc - we did this as we wanted to give her some responsibility around money and get her to learn to budget and understand what things cost etc

This has been working well up til now, she has no overdraft limit obviously and there has never been no problems. However she does have one DD that goes out once a month for her mobile phone, it is on contract and although the contract is in my name she pays the bill. She is good with it and we dont get her running up huge bills. anyway in december she got a little carried away buying christmas pressies and didnt leave enough in her account to pay her £27 mobile DD, so natwest refused to pay it and charged her £40 for the privelege !!!

Now as soon as she realised she didnt have enough money in there she went straight in and paid some christmas money into her account . I rang O2 for her, explained what happened and she paid her bill - so thats all sorted.

However I do think that natwest are taking the p*** charging a 15 year old girl £40 for one small mistake. I did get her to ring them and then got her to ask if they would speak to me but they refused saying they would only talk to her and as you can imagine a 15yr old had no answer to what they were saying to her - they just blinded her with technical terms !!

Now I knows its probably a good lesson for her to learn and she wont make the same mistake again, but it does seem an excessive amount to pay ! I know she signed the T&Cs and should have been aware of the consequences but does anyone think she has any chance of getting either all or some of this amount back?? If so how should we go about it / what does she need to do !

Any help / advice greatly received as £40 is alot of money for her !

anguk

Is it an under 18's account? My daughter is 15 and has a Halifax cardcash account, and I'm sure they don't charge for failed direct debits on their children's accounts.

Lokolo

Problem with this is:

Under 18s can't have credit, which is why under 18s aren't allowed mobile phone contracts.
So there should never have been that DD on that account for mobile phone.
I think the charge is allowed to stand though because its not an overdraft charge or anything, its a DD return fee.

But then again the charge shouldn't stand because she is under 18.

I don't want to be rude, but you're trying to teach your daughter about money yet you are sorting out her mistakes? By all means, support her, but she has to sort it, not you.

As Natwest have said, they have to speak to your daughter not you. Its her account, not yours.

Its halfterm this week is it not? Get her to go into branch and explain the situation say it was a mistake and she thought she would have enough money in the account and it wouldn't let her used her card otherwise or something to that effect and they may give her the charge back, but its unlikely in this situation - especially if they ask questions about the DD.

anguk

Lokolo wrote: »

Problem with this is:

Under 18s can't have credit, which is why under 18s aren't allowed mobile phone contracts.
So there should never have been that DD on that account for mobile phone.

The OP's daughter doesn't have a mobile phone contract, the contract is in the OP's name but the direct debit comes out of the daughter's account, which is allowed.

lisssa

thanks for your response. I take on board what your saying about getting her to sort out her mistakes, but that is what I was trying to do. Im sure you can appreciate she has never had to sort anything out like this before so had no idea where to start, Hence why I got her to ring nat west whilst I sat with her , but they just managed to confuse her and she had no idea what to say. I only ended up ringing O2 because she tried to pay the outstanding amount online but it just wouldnt work and i wanted her account back in order as soon as was possible.
We certainly had 'words' about her going overdrawn because ultimately the mobile contract is in my name and has the potential to effect my credit rating ! I didnt want the DD coming out of my bank account as I wanted her to take some responsibility for seeing how much she was spending.

Thanks for the advice about her going into the branch, I will get her to go in this afternoon and have a chat with them. Ultimately it is a good lesson learnt by her - I just feel the charge is pretty excessive, bearing in mind it is an account for under 18's

thanks again

lisssa

anguk wrote: »

Is it an under 18's account? My daughter is 15 and has a Halifax cardcash account, and I'm sure they don't charge for failed direct debits on their children's accounts.

yes im sure it is specifically for under 18's . She has just either a maestro / solo card ( cant remember which)

Lokolo

Yeh unfortunately the charges are always excessive (which is why sometimes we sound quite harsh! We don't want those charges ). There is a person on MSE called NatwestStaffMember but haven't seen him in a while so not sure if he'll pop by for some advice.

Yeh they will always baffle with big words to try and get people confused so they just hang up and never call back but if you're nice they desk clerks can take it back, within reason, so its always worth a try!

Good Luck to your daughter.

Lokolo

anguk wrote: »

The OP's daughter doesn't have a mobile phone contract, the contract is in the OP's name but the direct debit comes out of the daughter's account, which is allowed.

Thanks thats the bit I wasn't quite sure of! I just always thought that the contract holder must supply their own bank details rather than someone elses (so I couldn't set one up in my name but charge my friend... although I doubt he would then be my friend for much longer lol)

anguk

lisssa wrote: »

yes im sure it is specifically for under 18's . She has just either a maestro / solo card ( cant remember which)

Personally, I would just ring customer service myself and make a general enquiry about the type of account your daughter has and ask if there are any bank charges.

chipbeck

lisssa wrote: »

thanks for your response. I take on board what your saying about getting her to sort out her mistakes, but that is what I was trying to do. Im sure you can appreciate she has never had to sort anything out like this before so had no idea where to start, Hence why I got her to ring nat west whilst I sat with her , but they just managed to confuse her and she had no idea what to say. I only ended up ringing O2 because she tried to pay the outstanding amount online but it just wouldnt work and i wanted her account back in order as soon as was possible.
We certainly had 'words' about her going overdrawn because ultimately the mobile contract is in my name and has the potential to effect my credit rating ! I didnt want the DD coming out of my bank account as I wanted her to take some responsibility for seeing how much she was spending.

Thanks for the advice about her going into the branch, I will get her to go in this afternoon and have a chat with them. Ultimately it is a good lesson learnt by her - I just feel the charge is pretty excessive, bearing in mind it is an account for under 18's

thanks again

Go in with her love and they should sort it out for you. Had something similar happen with my daughter and after standing my ground they waived the charge. I agree they need to learn the ropes but they shouldn't be charged first time IMHO.

anguk

Lokolo wrote: »

Thanks thats the bit I wasn't quite sure of! I just always thought that the contract holder must supply their own bank details rather than someone elses (so I couldn't set one up in my name but charge my friend... although I doubt he would then be my friend for much longer lol)

I think some companies only allow you to supply your own bank details but others aren't bothered as long as they get the money!

A friend of mine needed to set up a direct debit but she was in the process of changing her bank account so she temporarily set the direct debit up in her daughters under 18 account.