Report Bank Charges successes and failures

nicksteam

I was sending letters to HSBC about my bank charges they applied to my account 4 years ago when I was shouldering my fathers mortgage and household bills for a year while he had been made redundant. At the time they didn't want to know anything, no sympathy from them whatsoever about my situation and they applied £1,300 in charges altogether. After several letters sent to them, all I got was automatic responses about 'getting finances in order' so I gave up and changed bank account's to Halifax leaving the HSBC account £1,000 overdrawn. It had been that way for 4 months and today I had a phonecall from HSBC asking why it was overdrawn and nothing had been paid in, I explained how i felt the charges were unfair and how I had a genuine reason for the year of financial hardship and the reason I had left the account £1,000 overdrawn was because I kind of justified in my head that this leaves me and HSBC 'even'. She was actually really nice and said she did understand my situation and she would see what she could do as she agreed I hadn't been treated with much respect or sympathy. Recieved another phonecall from her boss, who again seemed genuinely understanding in my situation who agreed to repay £800 if I would put the remaining £200 in.

So to recap, letters did nothing in my situation, holding my bank account ransom got me £800 back of my £1300 charges.

blonden

Ah, it all seems SO easy when you're watching on the TV and presenters are spouting about reclaiming this, that, and the other. In reality, the whole system is so complicated and difficult for the person in the street to comprehend, I wonder anyone ever manages to get a penny out of the banks.
I've given up on unfair charges, I'm going for PPIs instead. I've been offered 25% charge from CurlyWig but am thinking about DIY.
My opinion of the banks is that they are STILL too big for their boots. Its all too complicated, and they know we can be bamboozled at the drop of a letter. Or am I mistaken in thinking that banks are run by *^*"^*" rather than lovely sympathetic people - like in the adverts...

[Deleted User]

blonden wrote: »

I've been offered 25% charge from CurlyWig

So they've kindly "offered" to relieve you of a quarter (plus VAT!) of any redress which might be awarded?
They just put a stamp on the envelope containing your complaint!

You're only "thinking" about DIY? :eek:

piercedrab

im with tsb i sat went through my account and listed every fee a then called up i had 18 fees totaling £225 from recent back to 2009 after a hour of going through it all i was told they banks won a rulling and only need to pay out 1 fee in the last 12 months so i get 2 fees back totaling £25 i asked for a manager and shes escilated it to a complaint to have it looked into further

[Deleted User]

piercedrab wrote: »

i asked for a manager and shes escilated it to a complaint to have it looked into further

You won't be getting any more money in response to this ,I'm afraid; just a fuller explanation that historical fees are no longer reclaimable for exactly the reasons you have already been told.
On what basis did you "complain"?

You may also be asked to show that you are in current financial "hardship", but it's the Bank's criteria for that which you need to fulfil, not your own.

Forget this now if your statements show payments for subscription television, gyms and restaurants etc as they are deemed "luxuries".

thomasjbell7

This may be a silly question but would this only work with open accounts, or old closed ones too?

[Deleted User]

thomasjbell7 wrote: »

This may be a silly question but would this only work with open accounts, or old closed ones too?

It won't work full stop. Historical charge re-claiming is (ironically) a thing of the past.

In order for (some) refunds to be even considered by the Bank, the complainant has to be in current financial "hardship". If no account is currently held then no refund will be forthcoming.

thomasjbell7

Moneyineptitude wrote: »

It won't work full stop. Historical charge re-claiming is (ironically) a thing of the past.

In order for (some) refunds to be even considered by the Bank, the complainant has to be in current financial "hardship". If no account is currently held then no refund will be forthcoming.

Thought that might be the case. Thank you, it's saved me a bit of time now :T

Katespace

Hi - just wanted to say a huge thankyou. I finally visited your site after utilising all Martin's money saving tips on the TV series. I've lazily/ too busily not really considered making claims before but I recognised myself in a lot of the stories on here about packaged bank accounts. I used the template letter as a guide to contact Natwest about my Advantage Gold account. I only did this a week ago and have today received £1929.27 !!!
Thankyou for giving me the tools (and the kick!) to do this - the claiming process was very straightforward and I'm now obviously very pleased I did!
Cheers :j

jeanlucb

Last month, I used Martin's form template to reclaim the packaged account fees that Natwest charged me for my Advantage Gold Account from the year 2000!

And they wrote to me yesterday to say they will pay back those charges from 2000 till 2010 (when i should have received a letter explaining what the charges are) for a total of £1,881!! Got the money in my account this morning!

I will try and challenge them (to say that I knew what the charges were, but I did not know I had an alternative to get an account without charges) to still pay back the charges from March 2010 till last month, which could be 4 years @ £15 pcm + 8% interest max which could be an extra £777.

Will keep you posted! Don't be lazy, just enquire with your bank! It takes 5 minutes to fill and print the form, and an envelope & a stamp! Do it!