halifax bank charges (merged)

si1503

Hi,

I got incorrectly overcharged by a retailer, and as a result temporaliry went over my O/D limit with the halifax, I got the money refunded ASAP, and now, halifax have charged me £20, resulting in putting me over my limit again!

The charge is £20, the account is a student account. Now perhaps I wouldn't be so peeved if i only had £1000 of the advertised £2750 overdraft!

I take it I can print off a form to give them to reclaim these charges? Pretty ridiculous if you ask me as I bet they have more charges on the way for going over my limit again! :mad:

si1503

Jenbob2407 wrote:

Hi

Having asked, by letter and telephone, the Halifax for a refund on the charges that they applied to my account, which they refused, I decided to look back over this year and make a request for them to refund those.

Here is the letter that I will be sending to them...

Dear Sir/Madam,

ACCOUNT NUMBER: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxx x xxxxxxxxxxx


I am very disappointed in your response to my letter dated 06/11/06.
I now understand that the regime of 'fees' which you have been applying to my account in relation to exceeding overdraft limits and so forth are unlawful at Common Law, Statute and recent Consumer regulations.

It has now been confirmed that your particularly high level of penalties are considered to be unfair per se by the OFT who reported on the 5th April 2006 and are therefore presumed to be unlawful in the absence of specific proof to the contrary.

I would draw your attention to the terms of the contract which you agreed to at the time that I opened my account. It is an implied term of that contract that you would conduct yourselves lawfully and in a manner which complies with UK law.

I am frankly shocked that you have operated my account in this way as I had always reposed confidence in your integrity and expertise as my fiduciary.

I consider that your repeated representations that your charges are fair and reasonable are deceptive and that they have deceived me into agreeing to pay them.

Your concealment of the true nature of your charges has prevented me from asserting my right until now.

I calculate that you have taken £330 plus £28 which you have charged me in overdraft interest for the sum which you have taken. Total £358
I am enclosing a copy of the schedule of the charges which I am claiming.

I hope that you will enter into a sincere dialogue with me about this matter and I am writing this letter to you on the assumption that you will prefer to do this than merely respond with standard letters and leaflets.

I will give you 14 days to reply to me accepting, unconditionally, my request in principle and letting me know a date by which I will receive payment.

If you do not respond, or you do not respond positively, within this time period, I shall send you a letter before action giving you a further 14 days in which to reflect. I believe that these targets are more than sufficient for a large company such as yours with dedicated staff and departments.

After that, there will be no further communication from me and I shall issue a claim at the expiry of the second deadline.


The above, I think, gives them time to respond to my new claim of the charges that they have made this year and if they do not respond in a positive way then I will send them a letter informing them of my intention to take them to court.

I have tried my best to read as many posts here and the great information found at the consumer action group forum, the templates have been of help, but I would still appreciate any opinions on the above letter and my proposed action if it is not successful in getting my refund.

Thanks in advance for any help

Letter looks good to me!

After a bit of reading I'm hoping I can get mine sorted without the need for that, but you never know with this lot. I'm not afraid to close my account if the full value of charges are not fully refunded to my account, without the need to take any futher action. In other words even if they do refund them, if I'm having to give up precious time to write out half a dozen letters and visits/phone calls to X Y and Z then I'd rather go elsewhere.

dai851

Hi, I did the same with the Halifax and it took them 50 days to get the statements to me after about 8 phone calls. After I submitted the 1st letter, they sent the usual letter saying how sorry they were that i wasnt happy and the pass it over to their customer relations dept, or whatever and it would take another 4 weeks, i wrote back and told them i'd said 14 days, a few days later they phoned me and offered 2 partial payments, ( i have 2 accounts) 50% and 20%, I refused, submitted my court papers, and they gave me the lot back, it was quite quick. 3 months it was over. im doing the same for a few friends with barclays and lloyds and its taking a lot longer....best of luck

nickmack

Some rough figures of each stage:

Time for statements - up to 40 days
Initial Approach - 14 days
LBA - 14 days
MoneyClaim issue - up to 5 days
MoneyClaim case - up to 28 days
Payment from bank - up to 28 days

So it could be up to 4-5 months if the bank decides to defend then pays up at the last minute.

hunnybugs1

HELP urgent
We have just had halifax on the phone saying if we do not pay up the money we are overdrawn on the account we have just put in a claim for they are going to freeze all our accounts and cancel the overdrafts. we are only overdrawn because of charges but I thought they could not phone you up and hassle you anyway if the charges were in dispute. They want us to pay £80 today. Can anyone please help?

missphoenix

Hi,

Sorry I can't find my previous thread, so I've had to start a new one.

A few weeks ago I sent the Halifax a complaint letter as I wasn't happy in the way I was being treated by them. In my letter I also requested for a full list of charges I have received on my account.

The letter I got in reply was ridiculous and was just a simple standard letter not addressing any of my issues at all. So I sent another letter telling them this wasn't good enough and I wish for a better response along with a list of all bank charges.

Today I have received a letter from a different person, apologising for the other guy "failing to cover the main point of my complaint letter" He has also stated that a full list of charges will be sent to me within the next 10 days.

Surely this is too good to be true?? They can't be this nice when I'm trying to reclaim bank charges??

Any advise??

Bossyboots

Well, the rule of principle in the courts is that you have to have tried to negotiate settlement first. You can't do that if they don't give you the figures and answer your correspondence. Therefore, it is in their interests to cooperate to keep themselves on the right footing.

hunnybugs1

hunnybugs1 wrote:

HELP urgent
We have just had halifax on the phone saying if we do not pay up the money we are overdrawn on the account we have just put in a claim for they are going to freeze all our accounts and cancel the overdrafts. we are only overdrawn because of charges but I thought they could not phone you up and hassle you anyway if the charges were in dispute. They want us to pay £80 today. Can anyone please help?

CAN ANYONE HELP??? THEY ARE PHONING BACK IN TEN MINUTES!!!!!

raq

Morning all

Good news. ( at least )

Sent a forum on the weekend about bank charges and how worried I was that the only form of monies I would be having is benefits this week.

After so many calls to the Halifax I have had luck today. Spoke to management and although I had no questions asked i.e. this is my fault, he automatically cancelled them. It is a huge relieve for me as they totalled to £150.00.

I have had awful calls from them over the years but I must say today's call I cannot complain.

I am still going ahead with the charges from the past and so how my luck stands.

raq

morning to you

Any further luck with this ???

Just I had news this morning about my charges being taken from my account this week and a lovely genetlemen ( 1st one I have ever spoken to ) cancelled them straight away. No further questions asked. Nearly fell of my chair as in the past it's always been a no, no.

I'm really pleased as they totalled to £150.00. This is two weeks benefits for me as I have also just had another baby.

Keep trying, I spoke to the management side and wasn't awful, just doing their job

good luck