Santander are now refunding interest payments on Cahoot flexible loan's

UncleDennis

gibbskr wrote: »

Hi All,
Like many of you I'm awaiting an update from FOS after submitting a complaint in October.
When requesting my full account statements, which was eventually sent to me from Cahoot. There was PPI payments which I did not recall making/being informed of.

So I have made a claim for miselling ppi.......check your statements, this may be the best way of getting money back off the robbing sods.

I've been fighting them about the PPI payments and the interest rate hikes. The amount I've paid Cahoot / Santander over the years doesn't even bare thinking about! Anyway, long story short......I got a letter regarding my PPI claim last weekend and they've offered me a refund of just under 3.5k!

NICE! :T

I know it's all you bloody hear about at the moment. Everywhere you turn it's PPI this and PPI that! But if you think you were paying it and haven't raised the issue yet, then it's well worth the 10 minutes it'll take you to write a letter!

Now then............about these interest rate hikes!

Flyboy757

Hi all,

It's been a while since I have posted.

I have now heard from the FOS but only to say they are dealing with it and that they will keep in touch every 4 weeks. My original complaint went in in April.
It's a slow process!
I would ask you all to check your statements from Santander as I noticed that any time I made a larger payment into the loan (only a few) that immediately after I had 'larger interest rate hikes!
Were they afraid I may have been starting today off the loan? And therefore maximising their efforts to make as much as possible from me?
If this has happened to any of you... ADD it to your FOS complaint.
It wouldn't surprise me that someone somewhere made up a policy to do exactly what I am thinking at the moment!

Although I'm not holding out any hope from the FOS ( even though I made a formal complaint to Santander about a month before the 'payouts') but I would be more than happy to take this further.

Final question, I have gone on and on at the FOS regarding the fact that Santander hiked up the interest and then turned a variable rate loan into a fixed interest rate loan! Does anyone know if any of the T&Cs allow for this? Surely not?

Will let you all know as soon as I hear

Denza

Flyboy757 wrote: »

I would ask you all to check your statements from Santander as I noticed that any time I made a larger payment into the loan (only a few) that immediately after I had 'larger interest rate hikes!
Were they afraid I may have been starting today off the loan? And therefore maximising their efforts to make as much as possible from me?
If this has happened to any of you... ADD it to your FOS complaint.
It wouldn't surprise me that someone somewhere made up a policy to do exactly what I am thinking at the moment!

Having checked my account history there is nothing of this nature however if you made those repayments between June 2006 and August 2008 then you were liable to face hefty APR increases as standard.

Flyboy757 wrote: »

Final question, I have gone on and on at the FOS regarding the fact that Santander hiked up the interest and then turned a variable rate loan into a fixed interest rate loan! Does anyone know if any of the T&Cs allow for this? Surely not?

I have also raised this to the FOS.

Though there is the usual caveat in the T&Cs about amendments what they have actually achieved is amendment of the product itself, i.e. Flexible Loan into non-Flexible Loan, by removing the headline features.

In fact; having just reviewed it; I might suggest that we should have received both a new credit agreement and accompanying T&Cs when the product was migrated to Santander and changed from a Cahoot Flexible Loan into a Santander Flexi-Loan.

My credit agreement is specific to Cahoot (and via transference to Abbey National Cahoot Ltd) and the Cahoot Flexible Loan product and I am not convinced they can simply migrate this to a new product as they see fit.

If anyone out there has stopped paying down the debt (which I would not advise) then you may want to consider the above in your defence, i.e. the existing credit agreement is void.

Note; I have no knowledge on whether the above holds water it is merely an observation. One that I will be passing to the FOS in short order.

Good luck to all.

lizards

I had a Cahoot loan from around 2000/2002 (can't remember exactly) until I closed it in August 2007. I vaguely recall they hiked up the interest rates but I can't remember for sure. I have the account number but nothing else. It wasn't for a huge amount, a few thousand at most.

Is there any point me pursuing this? Recent posts seem to indicate it's a bit of a nightmare now..

Thanks!!

trsisko

It's always worth a shot. However, I'd lean towards them not paying or returning any money to you. It's also going to take an amazing amount for the claim to be looked at by the cahoots and the FOB (<=) service...I've spent a over a year waiting for an answer including the Santander element.

lizards

Thank you! I guess I have nothing to lose in sending off an initial email, but given even if there was anything to be refunded I don't think it would be lifechanging and we've just moved house so I'm currently buried under a massive todo list anyway!!

UncleDennis

Just had my final decision from the FOS. The email reads.........

"I have now completed my assessment of your complaint and have attached it for your review. A hard copy has also been sent in the post for your records. I appreciate that you will be disappointed with the outcome and if you wish to discuss anything please let me know and we can arrange a convenient time to do so."

I haven't even read all of the assessment yet, but I'm sure you all get the idea! The bottom line is Cahoot / Santander have not done anything wrong in the eyes of the FOS. For me, Its pretty much case closed as far as they're concerned!

VanGoghsEarhere

In my complaint to the FOS I've challenged the fact that no new credit agreement was ever issued for what is, essentially, a different product. I definitely feel that these are legitimate grounds to challenge the new 'fixed loan'. Whether FOS see it this way is another matter though. See highlighted below.
Section 61 lays out the formalities required for a regulated agreement. The terms must be found in a signed and legible document, a copy of the unsigned agreement must be supplied to the debtor or hirer, a copy of the signed document must be supplied to the debtor or hirer and a notice advising the debtor or hirer of his rights of cancellation must be included with the signed and unsigned copies. The "signed and legible document" is described in Section 61 as a document which contains all the prescribed terms, other than implied terms, and is, when presented to the debtor or hirer for signature, in such a state that all its terms are legible. Such a document must be in the form "prescribed by regulations".
The regulations in question are the 1983 Regulations (UK Parliament SIs 1980-1989/1983/1551-1600/Consumer Credit (Agreements) Regulations 1983 (SI 1983/1553) 1983 No 1553 "Consumer Credit (Agreements) Regulations 1983"). These regulations laid down specific rules regarding certain "prescribed terms". For example, a regulated credit agreement had to contain prescribed information about the amount of credit, the length of any fixed term loan, the amount of monthly repayments and so on. If a lender failed to comply with the prescribed regulations then the agreement would not be "properly executed" under section 61 and could then be challenged as "irredeemably unenforceable" under section 127.

kelr101

UncleDennis wrote: »

Just had my final decision from the FOS. The email reads.........

"I have now completed my assessment of your complaint and have attached it for your review. A hard copy has also been sent in the post for your records. I appreciate that you will be disappointed with the outcome and if you wish to discuss anything please let me know and we can arrange a convenient time to do so."

I haven't even read all of the assessment yet, but I'm sure you all get the idea! The bottom line is Cahoot / Santander have not done anything wrong in the eyes of the FOS. For me, Its pretty much case closed as far as they're concerned!

Identical response received today.

Says to me that these cases have NOT been reviewed independently at all.

halifax71

All the fos are capable of doing here is deciding if the terms allowed Santander to do this, not whether it was fair.

You will need to take this to court. Ten of you, £50 each, simple.

Have a read up on the unfair relationship test, definitely the way to go.