Halifax hardship response today

ally663

I have today had a response from Halifax re Hardship application. History: £1300 Claimed in 2007 on open and closed accounts. Most of the reclaiming process had been done at the point of the Hold happening.
In April 09 I sent Hardship claim.

Response from Halifax today (this is what they are sending out)

We acknowledge receipt of your complaint about unarranged overdraft bank fee. We believe that your complaint concerns the level, fairness or lawfulness of the fees. If it concerns something else, such as an administrative error, please let us know.

Having reviewed your account carefully, I am siatisfied that the fees were correctly applied. Your complaint about the legallity or fairness of unarranged overdraft bank fees will remain on hold, pending the outcome of the ongoing legal proceedings with the OFT, as explained below.

We also acknowledge that you indicate that you are experiencing financial difficulties. In view of your current financial circumstances we would like to arrange for our specialist Money Management Team to contact you. They will provide you with advice on how to avoid these fees in future and also work with you, to identify what further assistance we can provide to help you manage your current financial circumstances.

You will shortly receive a letter from our Money Management team providing details of how to contact them to discuss what help is available in relation to the financial difficulty aspect of your complaint.

Enclosed is a leaflet explaining our procedures for your financial difficulty complaint and the help the Financial Ombudsman Service can provide. If I dont hear from you in the next eight weeks, i will assume you are happy with the manner in which we have handled your complaint about financial difficulties.

Helping you to manage your money.

I note your concerns around enforcement action and request that you contact our Collections department to discuss the action you need to take to prevent enforcement action being taken in relation to your account. (Im not sure what this is as I do not have any enforcement due on my account, its a basic no frill spend what you've got kind of account)

Detailed below is the position regarding the aspect of your complaint relating to unarranged overdraft bank fees.

The bank along with a number of other banks is involved in legal proceeding etc etc

yours sincerely

customer relations manager



Im under no illusions this is a standard letter. Im curious to know what other people have done when they received this, straight to FOS or continued writing to bank or both?

Thanks

natweststaffmember

This isn't a final response letter so I wouldn't start at the FOS because without having a final response it is difficult to formulate an argument for the FOS.

Do you have priority debt arrears(mortgage/rent, utilities, council tax)?
are there any repayment plans on the priority debt arrears?

norwichkaren

ally663 wrote: »

I have today had a response from Halifax re Hardship application. History: £1300 Claimed in 2007 on open and closed accounts. Most of the reclaiming process had been done at the point of the Hold happening.
In April 09 I sent Hardship claim.

Response from Halifax today (this is what they are sending out)

We acknowledge receipt of your complaint about unarranged overdraft bank fee. We believe that your complaint concerns the level, fairness or lawfulness of the fees. If it concerns something else, such as an administrative error, please let us know.

Having reviewed your account carefully, I am siatisfied that the fees were correctly applied. Your complaint about the legallity or fairness of unarranged overdraft bank fees will remain on hold, pending the outcome of the ongoing legal proceedings with the OFT, as explained below.

We also acknowledge that you indicate that you are experiencing financial difficulties. In view of your current financial circumstances we would like to arrange for our specialist Money Management Team to contact you. They will provide you with advice on how to avoid these fees in future and also work with you, to identify what further assistance we can provide to help you manage your current financial circumstances.

You will shortly receive a letter from our Money Management team providing details of how to contact them to discuss what help is available in relation to the financial difficulty aspect of your complaint.

Enclosed is a leaflet explaining our procedures for your financial difficulty complaint and the help the Financial Ombudsman Service can provide. If I dont hear from you in the next eight weeks, i will assume you are happy with the manner in which we have handled your complaint about financial difficulties.

Helping you to manage your money.

I note your concerns around enforcement action and request that you contact our Collections department to discuss the action you need to take to prevent enforcement action being taken in relation to your account. (Im not sure what this is as I do not have any enforcement due on my account, its a basic no frill spend what you've got kind of account)

Detailed below is the position regarding the aspect of your complaint relating to unarranged overdraft bank fees.

The bank along with a number of other banks is involved in legal proceeding etc etc

yours sincerely

customer relations manager



Im under no illusions this is a standard letter. Im curious to know what other people have done when they received this, straight to FOS or continued writing to bank or both?

Thanks

HI there,

I got exactly the same letter today after chasing Halifax for the past two months. I have been calling all week long and bugging them and called the Money Management team who told me they would usually take you through an income and expenditure over the phone (regardless of whether you have already done one) and this process can take upto ONE HOUR on the phone. They then assess if they think you are suitable for the hradship category and refer notes back to your caseworker.

I spoke to a lovely lady there, who after 10 mins told me I should not be speaking to them as I have existing debt with HBOS preference account and if I am in any debt at all they are not the right people to be speaking to - they can only advise you on how to manage your accounts once you are out of debt apparently!

So, I went back through to my caseworker today on the phone and he told me that he will need confirmation from the money management team that I have spoken to them and once he has this he will progress my claim again, but cant promise anything!

I would call the money team and speak to them to speed things up as they said they wait to get a referral from your case manager to call you and this can take upto 2 weeks!

As soon as you have spoken to them call back your case worker and speak to him again as I am finding with Halifax you need to keep harrassing them, politely!

I had a claim with Barclays a few weeks ago and got paid out £1000 and they were so much easier to deal with than halifax....

Good luck!

ally663

Thank you Karen thats really handy to know. The letter hasnt come yet from the money management team but I think I wrote the telephone number down from somewhere.

Natwestmember, thanks for the advice. Yes there is definately priority debts, in fact most of my hardship is made up of priority debts Council Tax, Rent Arrears and current Electricity. I am confident from looking at all of the info out there that my case is hardship, coupled with the fact I was debt free 7 years ago untill a spate of charges one year, more charges because the previous charges caused me to go overdrawn, eventually all my debt was down to charges and a default was slapped on. I went from debt free to a default in a very short space of time. In seven years my situation has not recovered much. Funnily, if the bank were to refund my charges tomorrow, it would pay off my priority debts (the default has gone) and I would be ok.

I will phone money management and see what this hour long discussion is all about. ta

natweststaffmember

ally663 wrote: »

Thank you Karen thats really handy to know. The letter hasnt come yet from the money management team but I think I wrote the telephone number down from somewhere.

Natwestmember, thanks for the advice. Yes there is definately priority debts, in fact most of my hardship is made up of priority debts Council Tax, Rent Arrears and current Electricity. I am confident from looking at all of the info out there that my case is hardship, coupled with the fact I was debt free 7 years ago untill a spate of charges one year, more charges because the previous charges caused me to go overdrawn, eventually all my debt was down to charges and a default was slapped on. I went from debt free to a default in a very short space of time. In seven years my situation has not recovered much. Funnily, if the bank were to refund my charges tomorrow, it would pay off my priority debts (the default has gone) and I would be ok.

I will phone money management and see what this hour long discussion is all about. ta

ally, you need a final response letter. I can suggest an I&E form you can look at yourself. Can you tell me if it comes out as a minus?
http://www.moneyadvicetrust.org/content.asp?ssid=38

ally663

I'm confused. The letter today is not a final response? In the letter they want me to discuss my situation with Money Management. By the looks of things money management want to run through I & E, which I have, yes its minus. They suggest ways I can help myself I presume or as NorwichKaren suggests they refer it back to cust relations?

Im not contacting FOS at this stage.

:o

natweststaffmember

ally663 wrote: »

I'm confused. The letter today is not a final response? In the letter they want me to discuss my situation with Money Management. By the looks of things money management want to run through I & E, which I have, yes its minus. They suggest ways I can help myself I presume or as NorwichKaren suggests they refer it back to cust relations?

Im not contacting FOS at this stage.

:o

When you hit that route you will need a final response from them to argue the case. On the priority debt arrears, are there any payment plans in place to pay them off?

ally663

The Council Tax is with bailiffs and I pay what I can when I can to the Council and send minimum legal charges payments to the bailiffs.

The rent, no agreement, Im just playing catch up.

Electricity - They wrote to tell me I need to pay x'amount per month to clear debt and stay ontop of bill.

Just been looking at all of the above this week and waiting for payday to make a decision.

Why? what does the payment plan situ do (thanks for your help by the way):o

natweststaffmember

if there is a payment plan in place then it can be a legitimate no.

ally663

I see, thanks for that.

ally663

A quick update - I received the letter from Money Management and I called them. They explained what they do and that they would suggest things that might help me. I did point out that this has already been done by another agency but I would welcome the service. She then said "so I'll put here that you dont need our help", I said no thats not what I just said and I reiterated that I would welcome their service. She seemed a bit keen that I should be refusing the service. (is this because Customer Relations might not have to continue with the complaint if I had refused the service from their money management team??). Anyway the outcome was that I have to provide my inc/exp again (they do not get copies of the original claim that includes the inc/exp) then I need to call back and go through it, they then suggest any help . . . . . .then . . .who knows.....