Bank made me overdrawn

xyz123

Adams1 wrote: »

It's normal to forget things, you know. Some men don't have wives to chase them up and down with things they forget.

yeah i agree its normal to forget things..but then you got to accept blame rather than just trying to put everything on banks...

at the end of the day OP lost job in July 2010 and has had 6 months to fix this..you cant claim to not know about these charges and put this blame on something like "didnt check statements"....

adamc260

You seem to all be blowing this out of proportion... The guy went £4.95 overdrawn. While I grant they need to send reminders etc... it hasn't cost them £100 in doing so

anna42hmr

adamc260 wrote: »

You seem to all be blowing this out of proportion... The guy went £4.95 overdrawn. While I grant they need to send reminders etc... it hasn't cost them £100 in doing so

However whilst the origional overdraft may have been £4.95, it would have took a long while for the charges to accumilate and therefore by not sorting out the overdraft the first time, they have applied overdraft charges each month because of it therefore the accumilation adds up.

The bank did not put the OP over drawn, they spent the money went into an overdraft, and the bank applied charges as per their terms and conditons at the time, if the op did not clear the overdraft or the first charge and allowed the charges to mount up month by month, then the OP put themselves into overdraft not the bank.

I have sympathy for people who get into financial problems, but not when it appears people have burried their head in the sand and then blamed someone else.

Why didnt the OP contact the bank earlier to advise that they were suffering financial concerns due to loss of job, if they had done that lloyds would have referred them to the customer support unit for assistance and advise.

Also reading the post, it appears they had a paid for packaged account so if they knew that they were having no money in and could not afford to pay the monthly account fees, why didnt they ask Lloyds to downgrade to a fee feee account (ie classic)

masonic

adamc260 wrote: »

You seem to all be blowing this out of proportion... The guy went £4.95 overdrawn. While I grant they need to send reminders etc... it hasn't cost them £100 in doing so

No, there was a £7.95 per month fee that was charged every month for having the account. That's £47.70 over the six months. Take that off the £100.95 debt being pursued and that leaves £53.25 the OP has to pay for his mistake in going overdrawn.

£53.25 over 6 months work out at an average of just under £9 per month. That is hardly outrageous.

Malory

jonesMUFCforever wrote: »

It sounds like you opened a Silver account (£7.95 fee).
There is nothing in the terms and conditions of this account to stop you going overdrawn.

To get this facility you needed to tell the bank they would have put 'Control' on it - but this costs £10 per month!

To the OP - It sounds like you did not understand what you were paying for when you opened the account. The silver account, if that's what you have, has features like mobile phone insurance and breakdown insurance that you may not need. That is what you are paying the £7.95 a month for. (Possibly a good deal IF you can afford it, which you can't at the moment.) Even if you didn't use the insurance, it was available to you and therefore you had to pay for it.

I suggest that you switch to a current account without extras.

noizeuk

masonic wrote: »

No, there was a £7.95 per month fee that was charged every month for having the account. That's £47.70 over the six months. Take that off the £100.95 debt being pursued and that leaves £53.25 the OP has to pay for his mistake in going overdrawn.

£53.25 over 6 months work out at an average of just under £9 per month. That is hardly outrageous.

Could well be that some of the charges included unpaid items such as d/d and s/o, even paid referral items if he was using his card.

masonic

noizeuk wrote: »

Could well be that some of the charges included unpaid items such as d/d and s/o, even paid referral items if he was using his card.

Going permanently into an "unplanned" overdraft by more than the free buffer of £10 would cost the OP £45-£85 in the first month (depending on unpaid items) and then £85 (regardless of unpaid items) in each subsequent month.

Whatever has happened, the OP has gotten off very lightly as the maximum debt he could be facing after 5-6 months of unplanned overdraft usage (including the account fee) is around £500.

noizeuk

masonic wrote: »

Going permanently into an "unplanned" overdraft by more than the free buffer of £10 would cost the OP £45-£85 in the first month (depending on unpaid items) and then £85 (regardless of unpaid items) in each subsequent month.

Whatever has happened, the OP has gotten off very lightly as the maximum debt he could be facing after 5-6 months of unplanned overdraft usage (including the account fee) is around £500.

Yes. I (foolishly) gave access to my account to a family member who racked up 1000 worth of charges over 5 months with lloyds. Initiated by a D/D which was unpaid, went unpaid and they charged me standard fee + consecutive day charges (which now i think are deemed unfair by the test case threat), totalling around 200 per month in charges. I have managed to get the majority of the money back and it is solely my fault for allowing such behaviours to happen on my account.

What I don't think is fair in my scenario is that the bank have no procedure when a customer is being charged over and over and over when its obvious charges aren't being met.

I work for a bank myself and I have to empathise with the likes of myself back then, but there is significant room to change and operate a little bit more fairer. Not by much, but sometimes joe public needs a kick up the backside to realise the position theyre in.

NB. interest on my debt was 259 quid of a total 1044.

masonic

noizeuk wrote: »

What I don't think is fair in my scenario is that the bank have no procedure when a customer is being charged over and over and over when its obvious charges aren't being met.

Well the final verdict of the test case was bank charges did not have to be fair, but the process did lead to charges becoming a little better. Most banks now have a monthly maximum for fees, which, while on the high side, is better than how things used to be. You don't see £200 being racked up per month any more.

What I'd like to see is banks freezing people's accounts after a month or so of continuous unauthorised/unplanned/unarranged overdraft usage, writing to them with a final demand, which they can either pay or convert into a personal loan. Their current account, upon reactivation would become a basic bank account. If they don't hear from the customer in a reasonable timeframe, the account gets closed permanently and the debt gets chased.

Malory

noizeuk wrote: »

What I don't think is fair in my scenario is that the bank have no procedure when a customer is being charged over and over and over when its obvious charges aren't being met.

This is what good customer service is all about. You don't only do things when the rules tell you that you have to do things; you do something when it makes sense and will make things better for you and for the customer.

Customer has been putting money into the account regularly and not going overdrawn. A couple of months go by, customer has stopped putting money into the account. Customer is now constantly overdrawn.

How hard is it to try to contact the customer and find out what is going on? I bet if the OP suddenly came into a lot of money and put it in the account, someone at the bank would find the time to call them and try to sell other financial products to them.