Arrangement to pay - some advice please

jameslloydrichards

I am currently pursuing a claim with a bank regarding an arrangement to pay on my credit file. Essentially when I took out my mortgage, an account was arranged with a £5k overdraught on the back of the mortgage, to enable further borrowing for repairs to my house.

In October of 2008 the bank contacted me to let me know that the account had exceeded the overdraught limit. I contacted them and nothing was place on my credit file. In April of 2009, I contacted them to pay off the sum over the overdraught figure and to set up a direct debit, to cover the interest payments on the account. I advised them that I would do this later in April which I did and the direct debit, covering more than the minimum repayment was put in place for May of 2009.

I thought nothing more of this, having been advised verbally that no action would be taken and that this was fine by the adviser, nothing (sadly) was confirmed in writing. In December of 2009, I applied for a credit card with my main bank and they informed me they could not provide the car, because of adverse marks on my credit file.

I requested this from Equifax, and it indicated that since April of 2009, there had been an arrangement to pay against the bank account I've mentioned, this was ongoing. So I immediately contacted the bank to look into the issue, nothing apart from a holding letter. This continued and I contacted the financial ombudsman in march and stated my issue.

The arrangement to pay was invalid in my opinion after April of 2009 (effectively an arrangement to pay of one month on my account), especially since May I had been paying via direct debit more than the minimum payment.

The bank have advised the ombudsman that the arrangement to pay was incorrect after June of 2009 and will remove this from my credit file a good start, but that they believe the marks on my file are valid for April and May 2009 (as they advised that my may 2009 direct debit payment missed the payment date on the account, I had not been advised of this).

So essentially, where do I stand, I have cleared my credit card debt entirely :j, and have no debt apart from my Mortgage and the bank account I mentioned, I have increased my direct debit payment to increase the speed with which I am paying off the debt on the bank account.

I have no other marks on my credit file, it's completely clean apart from those two months on the account in question. So do I have any case against the bank still to change the arrangement to pay to say, missed payments?

Also, I wish to remortgage next year, will the arrangement pay make me effectively a huge credit risk still. I have a good salary and my outgoings are minimal?

fairtrade

You have already involved the Ombudsman, so they will be in a better position to advise you. On the information given, it would seem, that you made an arrangement which was not enforced - the bank didn't receive any funds - until June. Technically the bank are in the right, although you had contacted them in April and made a commitment, the bank did not get a payment until June.

The Credit rating is a different matter, as you have a nil balance, it may be worthwhile, in the short term, to use the card and pay it off promptly each month as this will demonstrate a period of borrowing and repayment which will be considered for any future credit application.