MSE News: Senior MSE figure appointed to official Consumer Panel

dunstonh

Really what is needed is an act of parliament prohibiting companies charging anymore than thier legitimate costs.

That would be communism.

Do you really want every company to be a registered charity?

How would you measure skills and knowledge obtained? Or lifetime liability?

opinions4u

davidgmmafan wrote: »

To be honest the whole issue of charges (of any kind to do with admin) is a joke. Really what is needed is an act of parliament prohibiting companies charging anymore than thier legitimate costs.

Is there a wider context to this statement?

If it costs the local plumber 45p in petrol to visit me, and he replaces a part that cost £2.99 in B&Q, should his bill be £3.44? Should a solicitor, whose job is basically glorified administration, simply charge for stamps and paper?

On the face of it, your proposal would do more to screw the economy than any recession, oil crisis or banking crisis in my lifetime managed to do.

We should remember that politicians rarely produce legislation that improves a situation. The law of unintended consequences nearly always applies.

(In fact I would set up a new quango, packed with the elderly statesmen of yesteryear who made their own mistakes during their political lives. Every Green Paper going through Parliament would be scruitinised by such a body twith the sole aim of indetifying what the unintended consequences of proposed legislation would be. That should significantly reduce the need for so many MPs. We could cull 200 of them overnight, as they'd have so much less to debate).

tifo

Milarky wrote: »

As a tactic, rather than going to 'service review' (after the Ombudsman this gets referred to makes their 'final decision' and agrees pretty well with everything their Adjudicator has said - as they're wont to do) writing to the Chief Ombudsman in person inviting her to get involved [ex 'service review'] could be of assistance to you. It worked for me..

I think they got rid of the Service Review (which does not change a decision) and instead the 'head' of the department looks at it. Then its the Independent Assessor after that (i've been to this level for the below). But writing to the Chief Ombudsman may help in some way.

I reclaimed credit card charges on accounts which were sold to the DCA and subsequently cleared in full for the balance asked (including payment of all charges, associated interest etc). I then reclaimed charges back from the bank. They wanted to send the refund to the DCA which i did not agree with (there was no balance). I passed it to the FOS and the bank again offered to send the refund to the DCA. The FOS agreed. I had to accept either this offer or let the bank keep the money towards their write off when they sold the account. The Ombudsman said it didn't matter that the account was legally assigned to a DCA and i'd paid it in full, because the bank wasn't paid by me so they can keep the money instead of the DCA. This happened for many accounts and i lost thousands in refunds which i was entitled to. In effect, i ended up paying the bank and the DCA for the same account. The FOS said i should ask the DCA for my money back.

The above went to Service Review (who agreed i had been given a good service) and then the Independent Assessor who said the decision was fair and reasonable.

My MP said to go for a Judicial Review if i wasn't happy with the FOS or just leave matters as they are.

If i ever ask the banks for the refunds they just refer to the FOS decision.

What a mess it was but a good story for the Consumer Panel to show how biased the FOS can be.

tifo

opinions4u wrote: »

Is there a wider context to this statement?

If it costs the local plumber 45p in petrol to visit me, and he replaces a part that cost £2.99 in B&Q, should his bill be £3.44? Should a solicitor, whose job is basically glorified administration, simply charge for stamps and paper?

It's a different matter with penalty charges. These are for a breach of contract and not a way for the bank to make profit. They make that mainly from interest and other avenues.

In your example above, the plumber and solicitor are charging you for their core service and you accept this when you use their services which are their only revenue stream.

A core service cannot be assessed for fairness on its price. This was how the banks won the test case last year because suddenly charges became a core service and thus outside of being assessed on the cost. Not that they told any of their customers that it was a core service.

tifo

dunstonh wrote: »

How would you measure skills and knowledge obtained? Or lifetime liability?

That's got nothing to do with it. Charges are applied automatically by computer and a person rarely looks at them. If it takes a clerk 10 mins (example) to decide whether to make a payment or not, it does not cost the bank more just because a manager is looking at it (i know a manager gets paid more but that's no excuse for charging more if the job can be done by a clerk).

dunstonh

That's got nothing to do with it. Charges are applied automatically by computer and a person rarely looks at them.

No they are not. David said "To be honest the whole issue of charges (of any kind to do with admin) is a joke". Most admin charges are not applied by computer. I dont have any charges applied by computer. Most accountants dont, solicitors dont or any small company for that matter. He was not referring to penalty charges.

If it takes a clerk 10 mins (example) to decide whether to make a payment or not, it does not cost the bank more just because a manager is looking at it (i know a manager gets paid more but that's no excuse for charging more if the job can be done by a clerk).

Looking at this example only, the manager has had training. He/she is supervised. There are inspectors to cover. There are actuaries that ascertain the likelihood of events that help the banks train the people to make the decisions. If banks had no bad accounts you could strip a branch of around half its staff. You could also get rid of the IT staff, the big premises that houses everything.

Who give the clerk the experience and knowledge to make that decision. There is also the cost of liability.

Whilst an actual admin task itself in isolation may only cost a few pound, the mechanisms and training and associated costs to put everything in place to allow the "admin" task to be done efficiently may have cost a far greater amount.

tifo

dunstonh wrote: »

I dont have any charges applied by computer. Most accountants dont, solicitors dont or any small company for that matter. He was not referring to penalty charges.

I think the context was more for penalty charges than anything else, not fees charged in the course of one's business. And bank charges are applied by a computer most of the time.

A professional person's service charges are different to penalty charges for a breach of contract. If you, for example, made a charge of £50 for not being paid on time, that could be a penalty charge if it doesn't cost you that much to 'admin' the charge onto the account, though of course i understand there is the late payments legislation for businesses.

tifo

dunstonh wrote: »

Looking at this example only, the manager has had training.

If a manager does a clerk's job (return payments) they shouldn't be paid a 'manager' remuneration on that. Otherwise every bank would be saying "the manager had to look into it".

dunstonh

tifo wrote: »

If a manager does a clerk's job (return payments) they shouldn't be paid a 'manager' remuneration on that. Otherwise every bank would be saying "the manager had to look into it".

The "manager" has decision responsibility. A clerk doesnt.

davidgmmafan

Don't be ridiculous. I am not saying profit should be outlawed, and frankly am stunned that people think I'm advocating communism.

Let me try again so called admin charges (which are clearly spurious) should be gotten rid off. For example Virgin Media charge £5 per month if I don't pay by DD, and refuse to give any info on this. They say it costs them and people just have to take their word for it. They also charge £1.25 per month (or so) if you want a paper bill but that was included in the price before.

Finally the most annoying one you are doing a transaction ONLINE and the company charges a payment processing fee. Eh? Do they want the business or not. Shop around I hear you cry. More and more companies are doing this because there is NOTHING to stop them.

Putting it another way there is a growing trend where the price is not the price. Optional extras are one thing - paying is an essential part of a transaction and as such the costs are for the business to cover NOT the customer, they would factor this into the price!