Halifax hardship - any advice?

tmb2k

Hi all,

I'm sooooo angry and not sure where i stand so any advice would be really really appreciated!
I went through the bank charges process last year and had to escalate it as a hardship claim.
Due to the length of time it took a reslove it came out at the same time the banks were successful in test case. AS a result I got a letter the very next day from the Ombudsman ruling in favour of the bank but that the original offer of £998 still stood.
I then contacted Halifax in January this year to take this - I simply couldnt afford to hold off any longer despite wanting to. Only now have they done anything to release this payment.
They sent me a form to sign which asked if i wanted the money credited to my halifax account (which is in arrears) or payment via cheque.
Due to my financial status I opted for cheque payment in order to pay off priority bills first.
Havng not heard anything again i just rung Halifax and they have decided to credit my bank account despite the option i chose for having a cheque payment.
They say they can do this as they are reducing my debt and its the agreement they have with the Ombudsman service (noone told me that!) - fine i get that but other than reduce a non priority bill I thought the whole point was to refund the payment for me to alliveate hardship. Also anyone i know who has gone through this has had a refund paid to them despite being in debt.

I'm so stressed and I know it sounds silly as my halifax debt is reduced but that money would of gone to pay priority bills which suffered in the first place as a result of continual charging.

I was going to go back to the Ombudsman but wanted some neutral advice first.

Please does anyone has any advice /comments???

natweststaffmember

tmb2k wrote: »

Hi all,

I'm sooooo angry and not sure where i stand so any advice would be really really appreciated!
I went through the bank charges process last year and had to escalate it as a hardship claim.
Due to the length of time it took a reslove it came out at the same time the banks were successful in test case. AS a result I got a letter the very next day from the Ombudsman ruling in favour of the bank but that the original offer of £998 still stood.
I then contacted Halifax in January this year to take this - I simply couldnt afford to hold off any longer despite wanting to. Only now have they done anything to release this payment.
They sent me a form to sign which asked if i wanted the money credited to my halifax account (which is in arrears) or payment via cheque.
Due to my financial status I opted for cheque payment in order to pay off priority bills first.
Havng not heard anything again i just rung Halifax and they have decided to credit my bank account despite the option i chose for having a cheque payment.
They say they can do this as they are reducing my debt and its the agreement they have with the Ombudsman service (noone told me that!) - fine i get that but other than reduce a non priority bill I thought the whole point was to refund the payment for me to alliveate hardship. Also anyone i know who has gone through this has had a refund paid to them despite being in debt.

I'm so stressed and I know it sounds silly as my halifax debt is reduced but that money would of gone to pay priority bills which suffered in the first place as a result of continual charging.

I was going to go back to the Ombudsman but wanted some neutral advice first.

Please does anyone has any advice /comments???

If the ombudsman has agreed with the bank with regards to the money then I think you need to ask the Ombudsman the question ie that you wanted a cheque to pay off the priority creditors ie x y and z and that the bank have simply repaid it into the account where the charges came from. Your argument is that the payment does not help or alleviate your financial situation(if you still bank with them and use the account it will be even better on that argument).
Unfortunately, I would expect any repayment on financial hardship to go into the account where the charges come from but if it does relatively little to alleviate your hardship then I would argue that it was insufficient. I hope the post makes sense?