Avoid First Direct - They are gonna charge all customers £10!

CopperPlate_2

M_Thomson wrote:

Don't worry, once the consumer action group lot get their way it won't just be First Direct customers that face the prospect of having to pay £10 a month. It will be all customers of any bank or building society!

Controversial...! :rotfl:

mrcow

Mercenary wrote:

Yes, according to a source of mine all the claims against bank charges that have recently been made (especially any that are done simply because there's a band-wagon to jump onto ) are possibly going to have the effect of the banks introducing fees as the only way to cover costs. As in "If you're going to complain about 'unfair' charges when you can't organise your own money and then claim them back from us, then we're running your overdrawn account for nothing....so we'll charge a flat fee so everybody can help offset the problem that's been created."

So who is your "source"? Some bloke down the pub?

If what you say is true, then why didn't banks charge a flat fee 15 years ago when the unauthorised OD fees for many of them was only £10?

EagerLearner

Interesting points...

The actual cost of each charge should have been £12 all along, from day 1.

So, banks have been making an additional £12 or so, on each occasion, for the last 15 years or so. That's alot of extra cash.

Where is all that accumulated money? Surely that is where the banks should now withdraw the 'refunded' charges from?

Therefore, the customer shouldn't be penalised at all.

Now, if the banks have just spent the extra money as the years went by and are now in trouble - whose fault is that?

Let's think what would happen if a consumer had spent all the money, and now suddenly the bank wanted their money back??

MPH80

mrcow wrote:

If what you say is true, then why didn't banks charge a flat fee 15 years ago when the unauthorised OD fees for many of them was only £10?

Oops - meant to hit quote and hit thanks! I didn't mean it!

Anyway ... The banks didn't charge a flat fee 15 years ago for 2 reasons:

1) It's far more marketable to say that your banking is fee free UNLESS you do something wrong ... (because actually - you can put a little star and write the 'Unless' bit in small letters)

2) Many banks, until comparatively recently (when talking about 15 years ago) DID charge for banking in a flat fee structure. They'd only really got out of it a bit before that.

M.

M_Thomson

mrcow wrote:

If what you say is true, then why didn't banks charge a flat fee 15 years ago when the unauthorised OD fees for many of them was only £10?

Another reason is that 15 years ago, there were no loss leading current accounts. An account paying 3 or 4 percent interest and giving free banking does not make any money for the bank. To make money banks have to cross sell other products, and charge for various services.

M_Thomson

mrcow wrote:

So who is your "source"? Some bloke down the pub?

And also several newspapers, financial news programmes, websites and radio shows that have stated this will happen.

DGGS_2

I'm with FD personally so I rang them up to ask them. Apparently there are currently no plans to make these charges although the person I spoke to said that the rumour-mill is very intact. So I'm not worried at the moment anyway.:T

mrcow

M_Thomson wrote:

And also several newspapers, financial news programmes, websites and radio shows that have stated this will happen.

Well thanks, but I'll wait for some credible evidence before I start worrying.

Mercenary

mrcow wrote:

So who is your "source"? Some bloke down the pub?

No.... someone I know very well who works in the financial sector. As mentioned in a post above, it's also in the papers and on the news

p.s. I don't frequent pubs so I don't know your friend Some Bloke .

C_Ronaldo

Bagger wrote:

Maybe I am being cynical. However, the original poster (Mrs_Jangles) posted this message as his/her first message. I wonder if Mrs_Jangles is from one of First Direct's competitors and trying to spread false rumors.

Bagger

shes only made a total of 2 posts, must be bogus