Bank charges

natweststaffmember

bookworm1363 wrote: »

Anyway, your lovely speeches don't touch on the point I am making, and I have yet to see anyone coming up with a counter-argument to my zero tolerance argument. So let's have it: what is wrong with not letting anything that would take you over your limit and not charging for that? It's much closer to a cash economy than anything else, and I have yet to see any argument against it, simply blaming the customer for their recklesness doesn't even come close to a valid argument.

Apologies, bookie, I don't understand the question?

bookworm1363

Simple: You have a dd or so due to come out, but paying it will take it over your authorised limit or create an unauthorised overdraft. The bank's automated system is set at £0 overlimit, so even though it would only take you a couple of quids over the limit, it bounces. It costs little if anything to the bank, where all it took was a small manipulation in the software which is easily absorbed into the running IT costs of the bank anyway. Because of the zero tolerance, you haven't actually gone over, and the bank hasn't had any costs to speak of. Same principle if you hadn't had enough cash in your pocket to pay the bill, basically.

What's wrong with that? Back to basics so to speak?

natweststaffmember

bookworm1363 wrote: »

Simple: You have a dd or so due to come out, but paying it will take it over your authorised limit or create an unauthorised overdraft. The bank's automated system is set at £0 overlimit, so even though it would only take you a couple of quids over the limit, it bounces. It costs little if anything to the bank, where all it took was a small manipulation in the software which is easily absorbed into the running IT costs of the bank anyway. Because of the zero tolerance, you haven't actually gone over, and the bank hasn't had any costs to speak of. Same principle if you hadn't had enough cash in your pocket to pay the bill, basically.

What's wrong with that? Back to basics so to speak?

are you saying that if the DD takes you over your overdraft limit the bank should return it and not charge if the charge takes you past the agreed overdraft facility? Or past the £0.00 if there is no overdraft?

bookworm1363

No, I am saying bounce = no charge, the same way that you wouldn't get charged at Tesco's for being told to put an item back because when you get to the till you don't actually have enough to pay for it.

natweststaffmember

bookworm1363 wrote: »

No, I am saying bounce = no charge, the same way that you wouldn't get charged at Tesco's for being told to put an item back because when you get to the till you don't actually have enough to pay for it.

I don't agree with that premise at all. There is a cost involved in returning an item unpaid. Don't agree with you on this issue at all.

bookworm1363

We are talking of direct debits and standing orders here. What cost is involved?It's a completely automated system.

natweststaffmember

bookworm1363 wrote: »

We are talking of direct debits and standing orders here. What cost is involved?It's a completely automated system.

A cost is still involved in the process. I think the Yorkshire whistleblower certainly did show that a cost was involved in this.

bookworm1363

Arguably. I think the CYNthesis thing showed a worse case scenario and it was apportioning costs, so that it would have divided each action and allocated it per staff head etc... Even so, the costs were pence.

If you'll forgive me to carry on with my Tesco's analogy, the person who's been told to put the stuff back by the cashier has cost Tesco's a few minutes maybe of the cashier's time, in which he could have served someone else. That is with human intervention! Someone who would have gone to the self checkout and realised they didn't have enough to pay would not cost the s/market anything. Ok, maybe if they abandoned the goods on the checkout, and that wouldn't apply to the banking process.

Not just that, but we are talking or re-educating the masses here. Even if there was a cost to start with, not many people will keep on trying their card when it has been bounced a couple of times, so the -very small- cost involved to start with would promptly hardly be an issue anymore. Thus you have a system where the charges don't snowball, where people have to learn to rely on what they have and not on what they might or might not get, at a minimal if any, cost to the bank. If as they keep on telling us they want to help us, surely that would be a better solution all around?

Lokolo

bookworm1363 wrote: »

We are talking of direct debits and standing orders here. What cost is involved?It's a completely automated system.

Software, Hardware, Maintenance, Electricity..... yes because all of this is free...

ahai1

The system maybe automated but the system does cost some money to run for example buying the neccessary equipment.

I think it is daft for the bounced item to be returned without charge. People just want a free ride.