Case with YB on hold, situation now worse, advice re hardship/FOS urgent pls

desperatedut

Hi, sorry if this goes on but to give all the background;
Originally claimed £2,700 across 2 accounts with Yorkshire Bank in 2007 (includes interest), they rejected the claim, we took them to court, paid the £150 etc, case was then put on hold while the test case began.
We waited patiently, and at the same time began to get ourselves straight and out of our overdraft. This was only for a while though, sure enough the charges began appearing again, one thing gets returned and all of a sudden YB begin hammering the charges on and before you know it the cycle begins again and we cannot get out of it again. Our income has dropped over the last few years, not massively, but dropped nevertheless. My husband suffered a near fatal accident in Dec 07 which added to our worries. Charges began dissappearing out of our account left, right and centre and we lost complete track of what was going where and just tried to concentrate on getting each bill paid as quickly as possible. We are not overly committed financially or anything like that, but the charges were knocking us over each month, or interest was going on the overdraft at different times etc, we just could not predict what was happening on the account, and just survived day to day, bill to bill. I took out a loan for £1000 to clear the overdraft, but sure enough, the charges have kept coming and I am now in arrears with the loan and the overdraft is back up to its limit. We have been forced to take a payment holiday from our mortgage to avoid getting into arrears, we have had late payments on credit cards, a catalogue bill and are in arrears with our Yorkshire Bank credit card (other ccard companies have been helpful, no suprise that YB have not). Things came to a head at the start of this year and we decided enough was enough, we switched all our DDs and salaries to a new account with A&L to try and break the cycle, we have no new overdraft and planned to pay the original YB one down each month.
We have gone over and over our finances and our expenditure does not outweigh our income, but the charges YB have slaughtered us with have left us in hardship, unable to pay bills on time, and without money for food etc. February this year, for example, YB charged us for £220??!! In one month??!! Strange, given they will have known we were moving banks by this point....
We honestly feel as if we have been ripped off, literally like we have had money stolen from us - it was impossible to tell what the charges related to, so impossible to tell if they were legitimate.
At no point have YB ever tried to help, never called or written, when we have called to try and understand what is going on we just got the usual charges are in the terms and conditions of your account, onus is on you to understand them, didnt have the time to even try to explain.
Then lo and behold we get a letter once our salaries have moved to A&L saying overdraft is no longer suitable after reviewing your account please call to discuss. My husband called the bank, our local branch, whose words were, no word of a lie, we can't help you, you have stopped having your wages paid into your account, it needs paying off immediately. He obviously was fuming, explained that THEY had written to US, and demanded to be put through to main customer services. Once through to them, lady perfectly reasonable and agreed a repayment plan on the overdraft.
Now, we are keen to refer our original claim to the Ombudsman, and also want to add all the subsequent charges on that we have incurred since. I wondered if anyone had any advice on the best way to tackle this, have read so much on here and there is a lot of different info, so wanted to make sure I take the right approach. Obviously, I need to ask YB for list of all charges since June 07, pay the £10 etc, but can I go to FOS in meantime, and say here is my original claim, we are waiting for new list of charges from YB that will add to it? I know YB will reject hardship claim (goes without saying, have yet to hear a success story from them) so am keen to get the ball rolling with the FOS as things are so bad here we risk losing the house (mortgage payment holiday now over).
Sorry for the length of this post, am desparate for help/advice, anything will be much appreciated.
Thank you.

natweststaffmember

desperatedut wrote: »

Hi, sorry if this goes on but to give all the background;
Originally claimed £2,700 across 2 accounts with Yorkshire Bank in 2007 (includes interest), they rejected the claim, we took them to court, paid the £150 etc, case was then put on hold while the test case began.
Please can you find out the terms of your stay with the court.
We waited patiently, and at the same time began to get ourselves straight and out of our overdraft. This was only for a while though, sure enough the charges began appearing again, one thing gets returned and all of a sudden YB begin hammering the charges on and before you know it the cycle begins again and we cannot get out of it again. Our income has dropped over the last few years, not massively, but dropped nevertheless. My husband suffered a near fatal accident in Dec 07 which added to our worries. Charges began dissappearing out of our account left, right and centre and we lost complete track of what was going where and just tried to concentrate on getting each bill paid as quickly as possible. We are not overly committed financially or anything like that, but the charges were knocking us over each month, or interest was going on the overdraft at different times etc, we just could not predict what was happening on the account, and just survived day to day, bill to bill. I took out a loan for £1000 to clear the overdraft, but sure enough, the charges have kept coming and I am now in arrears with the loan and the overdraft is back up to its limit. We have been forced to take a payment holiday from our mortgage to avoid getting into arrears, we have had late payments on credit cards, a catalogue bill and are in arrears with our Yorkshire Bank credit card (other ccard companies have been helpful, no suprise that YB have not). Things came to a head at the start of this year and we decided enough was enough, we switched all our DDs and salaries to a new account with A&L to try and break the cycle, we have no new overdraft and planned to pay the original YB one down each month.
We have gone over and over our finances and our expenditure does not outweigh our income, but the charges YB have slaughtered us with have left us in hardship, unable to pay bills on time, and without money for food etc. February this year, for example, YB charged us for £220??!! In one month??!! Strange, given they will have known we were moving banks by this point....
We honestly feel as if we have been ripped off, literally like we have had money stolen from us - it was impossible to tell what the charges related to, so impossible to tell if they were legitimate.
At no point have YB ever tried to help, never called or written, when we have called to try and understand what is going on we just got the usual charges are in the terms and conditions of your account, onus is on you to understand them, didnt have the time to even try to explain.
Then lo and behold we get a letter once our salaries have moved to A&L saying overdraft is no longer suitable after reviewing your account please call to discuss. My husband called the bank, our local branch, whose words were, no word of a lie, we can't help you, you have stopped having your wages paid into your account, it needs paying off immediately. He obviously was fuming, explained that THEY had written to US, and demanded to be put through to main customer services. Once through to them, lady perfectly reasonable and agreed a repayment plan on the overdraft.
Now, we are keen to refer our original claim to the Ombudsman, and also want to add all the subsequent charges on that we have incurred since. I wondered if anyone had any advice on the best way to tackle this, have read so much on here and there is a lot of different info, so wanted to make sure I take the right approach. Obviously, I need to ask YB for list of all charges since June 07, pay the £10 etc, but can I go to FOS in meantime, and say here is my original claim, we are waiting for new list of charges from YB that will add to it? I know YB will reject hardship claim (goes without saying, have yet to hear a success story from them) so am keen to get the ball rolling with the FOS as things are so bad here we risk losing the house (mortgage payment holiday now over).
Sorry for the length of this post, am desparate for help/advice, anything will be much appreciated.
Thank you.

You need the list of charges from the last list you have to today. Do you still keep hold of the statements? Do you do internet banking?
I think you need to find out firstly what exactly you were being charged for/

On the credit card charges/store cards why are you not claiming the charges cos they are very much easier to do than bank charges and may reduce your overall amount owing?

To be honest, there are elements that I can see on financial hardship but there are elements that are not currently financial hardship, ie priority debt arrears(mortgage/rent, council tax, utilities).

desperatedut

Thanks so much for replying - having spoken to someone at the FOS today they have advised not asking for a list of all the subsequent charges as this will take the 40 days at least etc, they have explained what I think you have been trying to say to everyone on here too, that this is not about just reclaiming bank charges, that this is about being in hardship and if the bank is trying to help (ie, being sympathetic and reasonable etc) they have said that obviously they can't do anything yet as I need to give the bank chance to answer before it is actually a 'complaint' re their answer. So the FOS have registered our details and said that if the bank dont come back with a satisfactory response go back to them.
I was concerned that I didnt have a figure (in that no new list of charges) to be asking for, their advice was to just ask for all charges on account to be refunded to ease our financial situation, even if they could go towards overdrafts/arrears on other things etc?
So re your answer above do you think that because we have took preventative action by having a 3 month payment holiday from our mortgage we therefore don't qualify for hardship as there are no arrears? Given that these payments would have not been met if we hadnt put the payment break in place and we would in effect have lost our home surely this can't be fair?
Again, thanks for taking the time to answer, you are helping so many people on here.

desperatedut

oh and sorry re the credit card charges etc, these have all been since the court case was on hold so are all at the new agreed 'correct' amount of £12 so understand there is nothing I can do about these.....?
Had already claimed for any in years prior to 07.
Thanks -

natweststaffmember

desperatedut wrote: »

oh and sorry re the credit card charges etc, these have all been since the court case was on hold so are all at the new agreed 'correct' amount of £12 so understand there is nothing I can do about these.....?
Had already claimed for any in years prior to 07.
Thanks -

£12 charges are most definitely reclaimable.
Furthermore, the stay question is important re the case in the county court.

natweststaffmember

desperatedut wrote: »

Thanks so much for replying - having spoken to someone at the FOS today they have advised not asking for a list of all the subsequent charges as this will take the 40 days at least etc, they have explained what I think you have been trying to say to everyone on here too, that this is not about just reclaiming bank charges, that this is about being in hardship and if the bank is trying to help (ie, being sympathetic and reasonable etc) they have said that obviously they can't do anything yet as I need to give the bank chance to answer before it is actually a 'complaint' re their answer. So the FOS have registered our details and said that if the bank dont come back with a satisfactory response go back to them.
I was concerned that I didnt have a figure (in that no new list of charges) to be asking for, their advice was to just ask for all charges on account to be refunded to ease our financial situation, even if they could go towards overdrafts/arrears on other things etc?
So re your answer above do you think that because we have took preventative action by having a 3 month payment holiday from our mortgage we therefore don't qualify for hardship as there are no arrears? Given that these payments would have not been met if we hadnt put the payment break in place and we would in effect have lost our home surely this can't be fair?
Again, thanks for taking the time to answer, you are helping so many people on here.

The payment break would in one sense be important if the charges were still bouncing all over the place because you have taken action and the action has not made as big a difference as it should have done.

desperatedut

Gosh I had no idea I could claim back £12 charges - I thought this was the cost you had to suffer now for a late payment? So can I in theory start claiming back all credit card, catalogue, store card late fees? Should the companies be offering full refunds or goodwill gestures.
Thank you again.
Yes to your point re payment break, it has not solved the problem, more if anything has now been charged since, and of course now the break is over we are back to having to find the mortgage money ontop of all the charges and bills we have fallen behind on.
Also we had problems with the CSA at the end of last year (before the payment break) basically they demanded arrears of £7k+ which we knew were incorrect, the case had been closed years ago. They demanded we pay while they investigated and said we either pay £300+ a month (which we did for the first month, then once our complaint was lodged we got this reduced to £100) or they would deduct £900+ from my husbands salary! So of course we had to pay it, and after a long and hard journey they have of course realised we were right and refunded all of the money last month, but in the meantime this has left us further out of pocket - do you think this is worth mentioning in our hardship letter to the bank?
Thanks -