Lloyds TSB £5 overdraft fee

littlewren

I am with Lloyds TSB and they introduced the £5 a month charge for authorised overdrafts (along with the additional fee) in December.

I am usually overdrawn every month, but in April I wasn't for once, yet I was still charged the £5 fee! Are you charged an overdraft fee even if you aren't overdrawn? If so, this is disgusting! :eek:

thatsean

You must have been overdrawn within the statement period - as opposed to calendar month.

littlewren

thatsean wrote: »

You must have been overdrawn within the statement period - as opposed to calendar month.

I've gone through the pages with a fine tooth comb, all the other £5 charges and overdraft fees tally but one doesn't. I wonder if they've made a mistake.

How do you find out where the statement period begins and ends when you look online, as I don't have paper statements now?

littlewren

Plus, for the period that I'm querying, there's only a charge of £5, no additional charge as there has been previously.

thatsean

Your online statements should have a from to date (when you view the copy statements online, not just search transactions), the start date is your statement period.

A mistake isn't impossible though. Why not give them a call, they should be able to tell you what have caused the fee to be levied.

littlewren

Thanks thatsean, yes I will give them a ring on Monday, I just wondered if anyone could shed some light on it first.

MME_2

littlewren wrote: »

I am usually overdrawn every month, but in April I wasn't for once, yet I was still charged the £5 fee!

Your billing period is usually the 2nd working day of a month until the first of the next. What day exactly was your charge debited.

If you look through your statement a month previous to that, it will tell you what period the charge is for.

dtsazza

I had a similar query with Santander (boo, hiss, etc.) when overdraft charges appeared on my account that I didn't think were correct. I had knowingly gone into my (arranged) overdraft for a few days about six or seven weeks before, but the charges for that period had already been applied last month.

Upon ringing them up, it turned out that what happened was that the few days I was overdrawn straddled my statement date, so I was overdrawn for a little bit in two separate months for charging purposes. Since I couldn't see where the cut-off date was, I hadn't noticed this, and the possibility didn't even occur to me (though admittedly the earlier overdraft charge was a bit smaller than I was expected).

If you're just counting the number of occasions that you've been overdraft, this may not be the same as the number of months where you've been overdrawn, since one occasion could be in two different months.

So I'd suggest double-checking where the boundaries of your statement dates are and whether you have been overdrawn any time within the most recent statement - allowing for a week or so from the statement end date to when it goes out, and perhaps a month after that for the charge to actually be collected, it's possible that the charge might apply to an overdraft up to nine weeks ago!

(If you can't see your statement dates online you might just have to ring them - I couldn't see mine with Santander's OLB which didn't help things.)

Chadsman

Why not change to a bank that does not charge £5 per month for using an authorised overdraft and save £5 per month?

bruvafromanuvamuva

I've just got off the phone to LTB customer service after they charged me £5 for going overdrawn (on one day) even though I transferred sufficient funds to put me back in credit before 15:30 that day.

Page 5 of their banking charges policy states:

"Avoiding overdraft charges:
Our Grace Period means that you have until 3.30pm (UK time) to pay in enough money to avoid any overdraft fees you may incur that day. The money needs to be immediately available to use, so you could transfer money from another personal account you have with us via Mobile Banking, Internet Banking or Telephone Banking or pay in cash over the counter in branch."

This is also listed on their website under 'Overdraft Charges'.

When I complained they agreed to refund the charge but the lady I spoke to was adamant that LTB policy is to charge the £5 fee regardless of whether or not the balance is corrected before 15:30, completely at odds with their documented policy.

If they don't change the clause within 8 weeks I will lodging a complaint with the Financial Ombudsman as they are currently misleading customers.

Lokolo

bruvafromanuvamuva wrote: »

I've just got off the phone to LTB customer service after they charged me £5 for going overdrawn (on one day) even though I transferred sufficient funds to put me back in credit before 15:30 that day.

By which method?