Answering bank charges skeptics: pls help....

MarkyMarkD

Regarding flam's many points:

- if you are paid late by benefits or employer, then the bank charges are down to the benefits agency or the employer. Make the responsible party pay, don't moan about the level of the bank charges or their applicability.

- charges are a small percentage of banks' profits. Complete rubbish. Charges are a huge proportion of the very small profit banks make on personal current accounts. Why should banks accept losing money on personal current accounts?

- "but if you are paid on monday and payout on monday you have not". I think you are referring to the fact that you have to have money in your account on FRIDAY to pay DDs on MONDAY. That is quite right. If you get paid on Monday it's too late. But it wouldn't be, if you didn't choose to pay by DD - about which see later.

- if your debit card costs the bank £3 why should i pay for it? I quite agree. It would be far more transparent and far fairer if all banking customers incurred monthly charges - to cover the fixed costs of operating the account - and variable charges - to cover the cost of individual transactions. It is a shame that no bank has chosen to go down the Easyjet/Ryanair approach here.

- a DD could be cancelled 1/100000th sec after bank clerk pressed enter on bank terminal (if not gone out, but many banks insist on 3 days notice).
more charge generating. lots of people are on very tight budgets. Not sure what you mean here. DDs cannot be cancelled with the organisation taking the funds less than 3 days before, because that is when they have to submit the DD request to their bank. If you cancel it at your bank, without telling the organisation you are paying, you are simply defaulting on your payment due.



And then re Graham's comments. Graham is spot on. Nobody is forced to go into an unauthorised overdraft. If you are incapable of managing debt, then get a basic bank account. Pay all your bills in cash when they are due. If you can't afford them, stop having Sky TV/mobile phone/takeaways. Choose utility providers who do not take payments by DD - and incur the higher cost that entails.

It is only because people *choose* to have accounts which allow them to get into a financial mess, that they get into an even bigger financial mess.

natweststaffmember

MarkyMarkD wrote: »

Regarding flam's many points:

- if you are paid late by benefits or employer, then the bank charges are down to the benefits agency or the employer. Make the responsible party pay, don't moan about the level of the bank charges or their applicability.

- charges are a small percentage of banks' profits. Complete rubbish. Charges are a huge proportion of the very small profit banks make on personal current accounts. Why should banks accept losing money on personal current accounts?
"The OFT's estimate in their recent market study is
17 that about half of bank revenues generated by personal
18 current accounts are derived from interest forgone by
19 consumers on their credit balances and that more than
20 30 per cent is derived from transaction charges
21 generated when a customer gives an instruction for which
22 he has insufficient funds or an insufficient agreed
23 overdraft facility."
June 23rd 2009, Sumption, QC, house of Lords Test case(transcripts are on Legal Beagles site)

- "but if you are paid on monday and payout on monday you have not". I think you are referring to the fact that you have to have money in your account on FRIDAY to pay DDs on MONDAY. That is quite right. If you get paid on Monday it's too late. But it wouldn't be, if you didn't choose to pay by DD - about which see later.
LloydsTSB and RBS group operate where you can pay in same day and avoid charges provided they are paid in by a cut off point.
- if your debit card costs the bank £3 why should i pay for it? I quite agree. It would be far more transparent and far fairer if all banking customers incurred monthly charges - to cover the fixed costs of operating the account - and variable charges - to cover the cost of individual transactions. It is a shame that no bank has chosen to go down the Easyjet/Ryanair approach here.

- a DD could be cancelled 1/100000th sec after bank clerk pressed enter on bank terminal (if not gone out, but many banks insist on 3 days notice).
more charge generating. lots of people are on very tight budgets. Not sure what you mean here. DDs cannot be cancelled with the organisation taking the funds less than 3 days before, because that is when they have to submit the DD request to their bank. If you cancel it at your bank, without telling the organisation you are paying, you are simply defaulting on your payment due.



And then re Graham's comments. Graham is spot on. Nobody is forced to go into an unauthorised overdraft. If you are incapable of managing debt, then get a basic bank account. Pay all your bills in cash when they are due. If you can't afford them, stop having Sky TV/mobile phone/takeaways. Choose utility providers who do not take payments by DD - and incur the higher cost that entails.
You can get pay and go mobiles Mark(please don't stop the small pleasure left after you take my Sky TV basic package and my chinese takeaway from me. I can't play snap on my own with my cards
It is only because people *choose* to have accounts which allow them to get into a financial mess, that they get into an even bigger financial mess.

see above Mark.

flam147

Graham_Devon wrote: »

The increase is about £1.50 per quarter. £6 a year.

And that's only for certain establishments, I know BT is one.

On the flip side, early payment gives me £15 off with British Gas on my next bill (I think it's £15).

The council, credit cards, my second business mobile, my insurance. None of them charge me any more to pay via other methods.

I said earlier, the reason for paying DD has been given in that it costs more to pay via other methods....yet people are getting charged x amount per month in bank charges?!!



It makes absolutely no sense and I can just not get my head around how something so imcredibly simple is seen as being a no go, because it's too difficult, wont remember etc. We live in an age where you can go online, check your balance, and make a payment within 3 minutes. Via other payment methods, if there isn;t the money to pay, you have 14-28 days to make arrangements, talk with the company, make sure you get the money etc, and then pay.

If people will not do this, then they can't reallty moan about charges. The lack of financial responsibility is sometimes outstanding. However, when you say something like this, your seen as holier than thou, or judgemental. People don't want to hear the responsibility part. They don't want to hear that they signed an instruction to pay on a certain date. They don't want to hear anyone giving suggestions. They want to hear "bad banks, not your fault".

i had £8 that i needed over the weekend to eat. bank balance showing as Declined, NO ACCESS to account online. telephone banking saying your account ending blah blah blah is nil (say's no pounds no pence for zero balance.) so i did not put money in for 2 direct debits. account suspended but they still charged me.

responsability does not allow any company to make charges and contracts that are not lawful. i would love to know what % of debt is bank charges on bank charges were you could get out of debt apart from corporate theft?.

people on here are imo forgeting a word called Hindsight

natweststaffmember

flam147 wrote: »

i had £8 that i needed over the weekend to eat. bank balance showing as Declined, NO ACCESS to account online. telephone banking saying your account ending blah blah blah is nil (say's no pounds no pence for zero balance.) so i did not put money in for 2 direct debits. account suspended but they still charged me.

responsability does not allow any company to make charges and contracts that are not lawful.
Flam, I do know where you are coming from but the above statement is untrue. Banks' made contracts that were unlawful with regards to protection on credit cards overseas. They were challenged all the way to the ECJ and lost the case.
Contracts can be made that are not lawful but once the legal challenge to them has been made and are found to be unfair terms then the term is then unenforceable and repayable(which is UTCCR 1999). It will be for the UK courts should the case go there to decide on how far back it should go.

i would love to know what % of debt is bank charges on bank charges were you could get out of debt apart from corporate theft?.

people on here are imo forgeting a word called Hindsight

I understand your last statement but many people will disagree. One person I know on here has stated in another forum that they basically ate baked beans for a month cos money was that tight.

MarkyMarkD

Thanks Nattie for your responses.

The OFT's argument about interest foregone will be way out of date. The value to banks of interest foregone at the moment is next to nothing. And, personal current account profits are not very large at all even taking account of those. If any bank is making money out of personal current accounts at present, I would be surprised - they weren't making much PROFIT (not revenue, which is somewhat irrelevant) out of them when rates were significantly higher.

I am well aware that some banks allow same day credits to cover DDs. That's their choice and people who want to pay money in at the last minute can choose to bank with them if that feature is so important to them.

And of course, you can get PAYG mobiles. It was just an example of discretionary expenditure.

Regarding the baked beans comment, that's life. If you have insufficient money to eat properly, and bills to pay, then you should pay your bills and go without. I can't understand the concept SOME people seem to have that their creditors should (involuntarily) fund their lifestyles if they aren't able to do so themselves.

flam147

MarkyMarkD wrote: »

Thanks Nattie for your responses.

The OFT's argument about interest foregone will be way out of date. The value to banks of interest foregone at the moment is next to nothing. And, personal current account profits are not very large at all even taking account of those. If any bank is making money out of personal current accounts at present, I would be surprised - they weren't making much PROFIT (not revenue, which is somewhat irrelevant) out of them when rates were significantly higher.

I am well aware that some banks allow same day credits to cover DDs. That's their choice and people who want to pay money in at the last minute can choose to bank with them if that feature is so important to them.

And of course, you can get PAYG mobiles. It was just an example of discretionary expenditure.

Regarding the baked beans comment, that's life. If you have insufficient money to eat properly, and bills to pay, then you should pay your bills and go without. I can't understand the concept SOME people seem to have that their creditors should (involuntarily) fund their lifestyles if they aren't able to do so themselves.

people need to eat and i paid the bills by different methods but my account was suuspended but they make things up as they go along
ie suspended except anything they can charge you for

natweststaffmember

flam147 wrote: »

people need to eat and i paid the bills by different methods but my account was suuspended but they make things up as they go along
ie suspended except anything they can charge you for

You may have answered this before, but WHY was it suspended? Did you ever find out?

flam147

flam147 wrote: »

people need to eat and i paid the bills by different methods but my account was suuspended but they make things up as they go along
ie suspended except anything they can charge you for

in no circumstances should the poor be used to pay for the rich if the banks cant afford to offer free banking then you should pay for your OWN bank account and i should pay for mine even a court with all it's legal powers do not take money in chunks that they cannot afford.
some people comit suiside over debt.

Graham_Devon

flam147 wrote: »

in no circumstances should the poor be used to pay for the rich if the banks cant afford to offer free banking then you should pay for your OWN bank account and i should pay for mine even a court with all it's legal powers do not take money in chunks that they cannot afford.
some people comit suiside over debt.

Even if you paid for your banking, the above scenarios would still leave you in the same position.

You'd just be charged to have the account in the first place.

IMO, and this is just me trying to help, you need to get some professional advice on your situation. None of this is the banks fault. Targetting the wrong people isn't going to help overcome the situation.

flam147

natweststaffmember wrote: »

You may have answered this before, but WHY was it suspended? Did you ever find out?

over disputed charges on other step account while i was very ill .
run this step account ok for 9-10 months with DD. it would be ok if the bank told me what they were doing and tell me you still need money in to pay for DD.

i now have a cashminder account and use an accounts package and a cash book that i carry with me. so i compleately ignore the bank balance and go with what my balance shows as, so if a payment takes a long time to go through it will still be in the bank.