Has your bank closed your account?

Elsie2_2

Well, tomorrow is they day that Alliance and Leicester have threatened to close my account so we'll see what happens. I have an ongoing complaint with the financial ombudsman, but as it takes 8 weeks to get a response that way and they only gave me one months notice to close my account, i can't see its going to bother them too much and the acct will probably be closed by the time they respond to the fin omb.

cuddly1

Hi.........hope someone can help:j ....Has anyone had their accounts closed by HBOS after successfully re-claiming back charges ??

Worried about this as remember a post a while back with some poor soul in predicament that thier banks closed their account, they had set up another account but the previous bank they were successfull with wouldnt let the new bank access the account holders info........:eek: :mad: ....any help please would be really appreciated , thanks xx

neiljor

Alliance & Leicester refunded £460 last month but said they would be in contact to discuss the future operation of the account.

Got a letter yesterday to say that my account would be closed on 19th May and asked for all cards and cehcque books to be returned in a prepaid envelope. I'm tempted to send everything back in a box to make sure that they have to pay a lot more postage than they expected.

june_rope

i wrote to norwich and peterbourgh asking for a full refund of my charges they said my expectations of the service they offer are beyond those which we provide therfore as i cannot agree to the terms and conditions it is in my best interst they close my account on closure as a goodwill gesture of goodwill only we will refund an amount to50% of the unpaid/paid item charges what do i do please? many thanks

Elsie2_2

Got a reply today from Alliance and Leicester saying they have had a letter from the Financial Ombudsman.
This is a brief outline of their letter.

"Having undertaken a review of your acct, i will explain the decision as it is clear you do not accept certain aspects of the agreed T&C forthe operation of the acct. In particular, Section 11, Interest and Charges. Whilst we may close an acct at any time, 30 days notice has been provided to enable you to make alternative banking arrangements. This complies with The Banking Code blah blah blah.

It is always disappointing to recommend this course of action, but when there is an irretrievable breakdown in the relationship between both parties, its difficult to perceive a viable alternative. In view of this, i confirm your acct will be closed on or shortly after 25th April."

Crap!!! :mad:
I have spoken to the Ombudsman today, and they say i can send the letter to them and they can pursue a claim against them if they feel there is a case, but its not going to prevent my acct being closed by tomorrow. :mad:
I understand they see me as not abiding by their T&C, but i feel that as they specifically mentioned the fact that i had just received my refund, this is a retalitory act! :mad:
I'll send my complaint back to the Fin Ombudsman and see what happens.

flumpystar

Surely, if you're getting charges in the first place, you're not conducting your account according to the banks t&c's, so why don't the banks close your account then eh??? because you're no good to them once you've gotten wise to the thieving, vindictive bullies.

biglugs

My brother had his account closed by HSBC in January, and they passed his HSBC personal loan on to their debt collection team and are demanding the full return of the remaining amount plus interest.
What is interesting (pun intended) is that he HADN'T claimed for any charges!! Are the banks now looking at potential risky clients who have had lots of charges in the past and closing their accounts in case they DO make a claim?
Anyway it annoyed us so much we HAVE now started a claim process for over £4,600!!
And to think he was only £16 overdrawn when they closed the account

oldwiring

Banks have always had the right to close accounts if the conduct has been unsatisfactory, and have used the right. Best ime to close a bad account is when the balance is in credit or at lowest net debit figure. TBH it's a shame they did not do this much earlier than the emegence of relaim sagas, as it would have taught some a salutary lesson, I am not mraning those who hade had genuiine misfortunes.

antopark

oldwiring wrote: »

Banks have always had the right to close accounts if the conduct has been unsatisfactory, and have used the right. Best ime to close a bad account is when the balance is in credit or at lowest net debit figure. TBH it's a shame they did not do this much earlier than the emegence of relaim sagas, as it would have taught some a salutary lesson, I am not mraning those who hade had genuiine misfortunes.

No missfortunes here, just bad at managing my finances, perfectly happy for my bank to recoup it's costs from my mistakes but not to 'fine' me for them. You could argue that the punative, illegal part of the charge is there as a deterant to making mistakes, to teach poeple a lesson and make them avoid doing it again. However, I think we all know that the real reason for the excessive charges is to make the bank a lot of easy money and that when they realise that a particular customer is no longer willing to suffer such charges they don't want to know and close the account. I'm surprised that none of the banks have realised that if they were the first to reduced their charges to a believable level, still with a small profit margin over their true costs, that they would attract alot of profitable buisness. Particularly from poeple like me who will keep making mistakes and are in need of a new account as they are proceeding with a charges claim.

biglugs

What surprised me though was that my brother had never complained about all his bank charges, and his overdraft issues when he did have one was of the order £100-£200 maximum. He is hardly one of these profligate people who are massively overdrawn to the tune of thousands, they have never taken him to court or had to get debt collectores in, never had a County Court Judgement or anything. He was the ideal customer - every month they banged him for £50-£100 of charges which he just had to accept.
Then they closed his account and I found out about it - now they're going to have to pay him £3,500+ in illegal charges.
Very strange, but will hopefully have a happy ending (for us not them )