MSE News: Bank Charges slashed by RBS/Natwest

Rich66

schlaus wrote: »

Hi I am a newbie.
I was pleased to see Natwest have reduced the costs of unpaid dd etc especially after I only rang them yesterday regarding a £38 charge. They would not reverse it as I have a goodwill gesture 2 years ago and they only give 1 in the whole life span of my banking with them (which I thought was silly!)
After reading todays news I re rang Natwest to ask them to reduce it to £5 but they have told me they cannot as it does not come into effect as of the 1st October. I explained that I really did not want to go down the road of claiming unfair bank charges for the sake of £38 but if they were unwilling to help then I had no choice to which they replied it was up to me but they could not help! Raaah.

Hi, I have posted earlier in the thread, but I got a similar reply when I asked in the branch yesterday, they said I would have to write in to claim. I think I am going to wait for the OFT official decsion before I do that, I'm hoping they instruct the banks to pay back automatically what they have taken above what is a reasonable cost for the failed DD etc. What do other think ?

natweststaffmember

Rich66 wrote: »

Hi, I have posted earlier in the thread, but I got a similar reply when I asked in the branch yesterday, they said I would have to write in to claim. I think I am going to wait for the OFT official decsion before I do that, I'm hoping they instruct the banks to pay back automatically what they have taken above what is a reasonable cost for the failed DD etc. What do other think ?

The next decision is not about refunds but about whether the OFT can assess terms for fairness so get that claim in now

rwilliams_2

Read the posts on legalb. Very interesting comments. I will work on some further info for you all! Hopefully some may be encouraged to join I think with the current account the credit unions all arrange their charges differently, which is why it's important for most people to find out what is on offer locally to them. I think my local CU are going to review the charges after a year to make sure it is cost effective to the members as service users, and as 'shareholders', but have managed to keep the charges low thus far. The smaller CU's are probably unable this facility as the charges to members would be bigger, thus less affordable to joe public. I don't view my weekly charge of 1.20 as money wasted as I get a much better service than when I was with the bank. In actual fact it seems to have saved me money as my bus fare was almost double that to visit the CU! Knowing they will transfer over my savings to cover Direct Debit's in the case there were insufficient funds, I try to make sure I keep enough money saved in my share account to cover the amount should it ever happen. It just seems to be very convenient for me. People have their own preferences; what one considers good value for money, another considers a waste of money. Personally, I will not be funding any banker bonuses this year, that is priceless!

Will try and drop in some relevant input on the other site when I get a chance!

esmerellda

rwilliams wrote: »

Read the posts on legalb. Very interesting comments. I will work on some further info for you all! Hopefully some may be encouraged to join I think with the current account the credit unions all arrange their charges differently, which is why it's important for most people to find out what is on offer locally to them. I think my local CU are going to review the charges after a year to make sure it is cost effective to the members as service users, and as 'shareholders', but have managed to keep the charges low thus far. The smaller CU's are probably unable this facility as the charges to members would be bigger, thus less affordable to joe public. I don't view my weekly charge of 1.20 as money wasted as I get a much better service than when I was with the bank. In actual fact it seems to have saved me money as my bus fare was almost double that to visit the CU! Knowing they will transfer over my savings to cover Direct Debit's in the case there were insufficient funds, I try to make sure I keep enough money saved in my share account to cover the amount should it ever happen. It just seems to be very convenient for me. People have their own preferences; what one considers good value for money, another considers a waste of money. Personally, I will not be funding any banker bonuses this year, that is priceless!

Will try and drop in some relevant input on the other site when I get a chance!

Thank you, that would be great. the dual accounts system was one of the big factors when I began looking into credit unions further so would be great to have some personal experiences of using the CU.

The charges, the CU doesnt make a profit on them, the co-operative bank charges the CU £15 and they have to pass that to the customers, so I think its the co-operative should be lobbied to bring their charges down.

moneymonkey35

natweststaffmember wrote: »

They OFT have already told them that the terms are unfair.
The OFT is awaiting a legal decision so any change to the cost of the terms makes not difference to the actual term itself and its fairness.
Regardless of today's announcement, if the term is deemed unfair then it is unenforceable in its entirety, that means that even charges levied at a lower amount ARE reclaimable.

Hallelujah! :beer:
Hopefully it won't be long before we all have OUR money back.

For me, it is has been almost a year since I started reclaiming and I have had to jump through hoops in order to simply be heard (still trying to be heard - my case is not resolved in any sense!) and I'm tired!

Good on ya Martin for fighting so hard and inspiring us all! :money: