Bank Charges Reclaiming Guide discussion

dunstonh

sharonsugar wrote: »

I wrote to Barclays years ago to complain about the unfair overdraft charges on my account, at the time I was in financial dire straits and struggled every month to keep within the £2,000 overdraft limit. At the time I was charged a fee for the account (which I am claiming against), interest on my overdraft AND overdraft fees, which I think were £35 a time back then.

I wrote to them years ago, before all this reclaiming was known about as I felt it was so unfair, that their way of banking actually kept me trapped in an expensive situation that I had no way of improving - they offered me no other help (loan or credit card option).

They did nothing for my case - and today feeling inspired by everyone success stories I thought I would try again. I spoke to Barclays who say they can only give me statements as far back as 6 years, is this true!?

And surely this isn't fair, especially when I made attempts (in writing) to address these unfair charges. How do I take this forward or do I just accept six years is as far back as they will go?

Thanks

You have well and truly missed the boat on this one. The banks won the court case on bank charges in 2009.

And yes, it is fair as they have to comply with the data protection act (and the FCA recommend 6 years for that).

You will not win a complaint about unfair bank charges any more.

Nasqueron

A credit card or loan wouldn't have been any use to you - you were obviously unable to pay your debts so a CC would just have resulted in more charges (at best a month reprieve before you were being billed for that and late charges) and contrary to popular myth, consolidation loans don't help - typically people just run up their debt again and then have twice as much and extra interest

Megrant

Hi, I claimed on breakdown insurance once. Would I still be able to make a claim for repayment of my monthly fees?

dunstonh

Megrant wrote: »

Hi, I claimed on breakdown insurance once. Would I still be able to make a claim for repayment of my monthly fees?

This thread is about overdraft and unpaid items bank charges. Not package account charges.

However, in answer to your question, yes you can still complain. Your chances of success in the complaint are reduced as you cannot state you didnt know about it as you used a feature from it. Also, if they decide to uphold your complaint, they can deduct the actual cost of the claimed event from any redress payable.

Rubybiker

Hi

I am so new to this so may be in wrong place, and will I ever find it again, anyway here goes. I, we have been with the same bank for over 45 years, always been happy with them, when first married we had our bank account with, it was years and years before we realised what bank charges were for , ignorantly thought it was usual charges for use of account etc. Over the last 10 years or so we found out what it was for and have made a couple of claims, always having to pay a certain amount also for claiming. But and a big but, as far as we can remember we were never told about the charges when taking on the account. Are we still able to claim back charges as we have used services and would our bank make us leave them if we tried to claim. Have wondered about this for a long time now. Look forward to some replies. Thank you for any useful advice.

Nasqueron

Rubybiker wrote: »

Hi

I am so new to this so may be in wrong place, and will I ever find it again, anyway here goes. I, we have been with the same bank for over 45 years, always been happy with them, when first married we had our bank account with, it was years and years before we realised what bank charges were for , ignorantly thought it was usual charges for use of account etc. Over the last 10 years or so we found out what it was for and have made a couple of claims, always having to pay a certain amount also for claiming. But and a big but, as far as we can remember we were never told about the charges when taking on the account. Are we still able to claim back charges as we have used services and would our bank make us leave them if we tried to claim. Have wondered about this for a long time now. Look forward to some replies. Thank you for any useful advice.

If you are complaining about a packaged account and you used the services on it, you must present good reasons why you think the account was unsuitable. The bank will reduce any payout based on the value of the services you used. They are unlikely to make you leave but obviously they will move you onto a more basic unpaid account so if your account has benefits such as a free overdraft as part of the package and they don't offer a free OD for other accounts then you would start paying for that

PANFACE

We have had a Lloyd package account since 2002. We didn't realise that an account was available without the charges. I sent a claim to lloyds using the resolver site. We had a phone call to say that our claim was being looked into. 24 hours later we had a call back to say we had used the AA insurance twice therefore our claim was being denied. If you are paying for the privilege shouldn't it be used? Help please

dunstonh

PANFACE wrote: »

We have had a Lloyd package account since 2002. We didn't realise that an account was available without the charges. I sent a claim to lloyds using the resolver site. We had a phone call to say that our claim was being looked into. 24 hours later we had a call back to say we had used the AA insurance twice therefore our claim was being denied. If you are paying for the privilege shouldn't it be used? Help please

This thread is not about packaged bank accounts. However, if you have used the benefits it significantly weakens your complaint (you cant say you didnt know you had it or it was of no use to you). Sometimes they will still uphold the complaint but in those cases they deduct the cost of the benefit from the redress (often wiping out the redress).

Nasqueron

PANFACE wrote: »

We have had a Lloyd package account since 2002. We didn't realise that an account was available without the charges. I sent a claim to lloyds using the resolver site. We had a phone call to say that our claim was being looked into. 24 hours later we had a call back to say we had used the AA insurance twice therefore our claim was being denied. If you are paying for the privilege shouldn't it be used? Help please

Essentially you are saying that you didn't want the account to begin with but also that you did want the account as you used the benefits. That is why they rejected it - it does depend on what your complaint reason was but anything like saying you didn't know about it or had no need for it would be an easy rejection given you used the benefit.

PANFACE

We did know we had the benefits of the account but at the time we did not know we could have had an account with out paying charges.we thought that the benefits just came with the account. If offered a non charge account I am sure we would have chosen this. What do I say when I phone the bank back? Do you understand what I am trying to say? Thanks