Do you have money worries and a loan or credit card with your bank?

bluedawng

daallen wrote: »

I was a victim of this setting off just last week, I'm on benefits and they had been paid in on the Tuesday and the bank took £142 of my £150 which included child benefit and child tax credit, when i contacted the bank they where totally uncaring, if ordinary people did things like this it would be against the law, on a previous occasion I'd made a payment and they still took money from me, it's disgusting, to think that this can happen legally

Please see my note on 1st right of apropriation, you are classed as being in a vulnerable staus as you are on benefits, demand you money back from the bank!! Don't let them fob you off, this is your basic living money!!
Good luck

bluedawng

Newbie06 wrote: »

This happened to me last week as well.. I then tried to open a bank account with coop, but when talking to them on the telephone it has gone to "referrred" status and they said they would let me know if my application was succesfull - so far have heard nothing.... I have lots of missed payments so my credit file isn't looking too good..

What would be a good bank/b.society to apply to to avoid this happening again next month? does anyone know?

Search this site for the best basic bank accounts list from the fsa it's really good, many basic accounts don't require a credit rating just to confirm no fraud or bancruptcy, my advice would be to contact co-op and chase your application don't wait for them keep chasing them till you get an answer on your application it may be they need more info from you. We are in a good position at the moment many banks now need more customers due to their failing finances. co-op are a good one so be persistent.

Good Luck and Power t the Little People

bluedawng

joy47 wrote: »

I took out a mortgage on my property for a loan for my partner on condition he made the repayments. We had to have a joint bank account at the same bank for the payments to come out of. I had nothing to do with this account until my partner stopped paying the mortgage. I then discovered he had taken out a credit card in his name only on the account and was in debt. The bank knew the situation amd knew I had no knowledge of the card debt. I have been paying the mortgage for the last 18 months but last month when I went in to pay my mortgage they took the payment and then told me that the money had gone towards the card debt. I had been worried that they might do this and had made sure that I went into the bank and specifically asked for the money to be paid into the mortgage acount and not paid into the joint account. The bank then said I had to pay off the card debt before they would accept payments off the mortgage. In order to prevent my property being repossesed I have had to borrow the money from my family to pay off this credit card. Did they have the right to do this?

Hi there, Under 1st Right of Apropriation if you have a debt and you send money to pay that off it is you who decides which debt that money is apropriated to and not the person or company which you owe. i.e if you have a credit card and a loan of the same amount you send a cheque to be paid off of the loan this is the debt that the funds MUST be apropriated to. The bank misadvised you and i bet they charged you for the privelidge too?? Demand the money be apropriated as YOU specified and demand any charges incurred back from them. If the credit card is no longer in use but still in debt offer an affordable repayment arrangement with them, if the card is still in use cut it up and send it back to them and demand a stop put on the account so another cannot be reissued without your knowledge.

Good Luck and Power to the Little People.x

bluedawng

Lauren-s wrote: »

my sister has a gold account with lloyds tsb. she lost her job so enquired about dropping the direct debit for life insurance that cam with this account. the bank agreed to this but only a few months later she recieved a letter saying that she was overdrawn by £180 due to bank charges. she has been paying off this debt for a long time now but the bank keep wanting to add charges. how can she finish this completely and how can i prevent this from happening to me?

Hi there, she should log a formal complaint with the bank manager and then the banking ombudsman, most banks have recorded calls if she was advised she could stop payments then these were still taken she needs to know why and should have been advised this on the call. It sounds a bit like payment protection where you buy the insurance as a package but with as it was just for the account that doesn't sound right at all. Tell her to request a copy of the Terms and Conditions of the account and a list of bank charges that apply, get all statements and take these to the CAB they should be able to help, if no joy there then definately the banking ombudsman.

As she lost her job she may have been able to claim under the insurance, if this was a benefit of the insurance, get her to check her policy booklet. She would be able to claim even if she is no longer paying as would have been covered at the time she lost her job.

Good Luck and Power to the Little People xx

bluedawng

Honolula13 wrote: »

I have contacted HSBC to let them know I cannot meet my full loan repayment this month. Aware of this problem I have opened an account elsewhere, for my priority payments. HSBC responded by taking the money out of my account with them, and putting me into overdraft (charging a temp overdraft fee), even though I did not previously have an overdraft with them. Can they continue doing this every month that I fail to meet my payments? It seems logical to me that if you owe them money, and you appear to have it in your account, they can take it. But it doesn't make sense to me, that they will take money out of your account, putting you into an overdraft, that has not been mutually approved.

Is there anything I can do?

Hi there, this is another trick banks like to use, they will not let you close your bank account as it is used to service your loan, thereby putting you more and more in debt each month. Be careful with HSBC they have a habit of harrasing people with phone calls, if these start note them all down as can be used as evidence and forwarded in a formal complaint to the Office of Fair Trading!!

Also be wary of managed loans, hsbc like to offer these too. I would advise if you have had a change in your income or expenditure you try and rearrange your loan to reduce your payments, again be careful of a managed loan and anything that would increase the length and cost of the debt overall. Technically speaking again if you advised you were unable to make a contractual payment and by taking this they put you in an overdraft they cannot charge you for this. Speak to them and see what can be arranged, if you get no joy contact the banking ombudsman. Try to continue with your normal repayments if able to.

Good Luck - Power to the Little People x

bluedawng

lisa110rry wrote: »

Now you have me a little worried. I've just changed to Lloyds TSB "Duo" for my credit card, I have been offered what I consider to be quite a high credit limit (over £4k), I have no balance transfer and when this month's payment has been made on my previous card, I will ask for it to be cancelled. (The reason for change is a little odd - my bank sent me a new debit card which was visually exactly identical to my credit card and my eyesight is poor, I didn't want to accidentally use my c/c to withdraw cash at an ATM.)

My question is: I have a joint account with my husband at Lloyds TSB, where we also have loans, which are being paid regularly and our current account is in credit. Would Lloyds TSB be able to "offset backwards" if we were to hit difficulties with our joint current account or loans and take what could hypothetically be an unlimited amount of credit from my credit card to offset against any default or overdraft? (My c/c has a direct debit from an account at a different bank in my name to pay the full amount each month.)

I'd be grateful for comments, for safety I may have to change my c/c again!

Hi there Lisa, in my experience this is not done, hypathetically speaking this would be of no benefit to the bank as effectively any monies available on a credit card is already their's so to in effect pay themselves serves no purpose other than to put you further in debt. The 'offset law' is commonly used when funds you have in your current account are removed thereby paying off some of the sum owed to them by your money. However having said that it is not uncommon for the bank to take more money from a current account to service a loan repayment thereby putting the customer into an unarranged overdraft and charging astronomically for this. My advice would be to transfer your loan, cc and current acount to seperate banks, then they are unable to do this.

Good Luck - Power to the Little People

bluedawng

brookway wrote: »

I bank with Lloyds and they have taken money from a joint account to pay my credit card. If my partner hadn't noticed that this had gone from our joint acoount and paid more monies in we would have defaulted on our mortgage. We us the joint account to pay all our household bills and nothing else. Why should my partner be responsible for my debts Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr the banks do annoy me!!!!!!!!

Hi there unfortunately this is the case. It was uncertain as to whether the offset could be applied to a joint account however, it appears to be quite common practice. This is similar to the fact that in the effect of death your debt does unfortunately not die with you and a creditor will go to the next of kin to get the money, this is the same when alive if the main debtor cannot furnish repayments on a debt the creditor will go to the next available source, usually a spouse. If you are in financial difficulties however it would be the income and expenditure form both that would need to be taken into account.

bluedawng

bevan840 wrote: »

I was just wondering, if you are making your minimum repayments on the cards can they still take money from your account? Or is it only when you miss a payment?

Hi it's only if a minimum payment is missed. Worth noting though that they can only take the amount of the missed payment and not the total amount outstanding.

michelle63_2

Good morning, first posting for me, hope i'm posting in the correct place.

I bank with Halifax - in september 08 i had £900 taken from my account to pay the missed payments on my Halifax credit card. At that time my earnings going into the bank were £1 300, leaving me with very little to live on, wasn't able to pay all the bills for that month. Because of this a large amount of money was taken the following month in bank charges. Again in Feb 09 they took £ 300. The card is now clear, destroyed!!! I am still however playing catch up to try to pay back the overdraft. I am now in the process of looking to open a new bank account after 30 yrs of banking with the Halifax

mooomin

Human_remains wrote: »

:mad: Are you aware that if you work for an instition ie Lloyds for example, You have to have an account with them or you dont get payed, is this not another way of stopping you moving funds to another bank ?? is this legal?

It depends on the bank tbh, not all of them make you pay your wages into an account with them (I work for a bank who I do bank with, but my friend who also works for us has her wages paid elsewhere with no issues)

It doesn't stop me moving my funds elsewhere - I transfer my wages out to my other account on payday! I opened the account as I didn't have a bank account when I started working for them, and still find it convenient to have. Of course, there are staff benefits with some of the accounts as well which helps.

If you work for a financial institution you have to declare any financial difficulty (At my place of work anyway) and in that regard staff would be treated the same as customers. If I did get in a situation where I was worried that my employer would use Right Of Set Off, I would ask payroll to pay my wages to my external bank account, and they would do that for me without issue.

I am aware though that some banks do make it a condition of employment that you bank with them and have your wages paid into an account with that bank (RBS springs to mind, not sure of any others)

Hope that helps.

f_f