Anyone had experience of a company/solicitor doing the work of reclaiming? (merged)

Tozer

You will have no better prospects with them than doing it yourself.

andrewman

Over the past few months to a year,i have been using Oasis, to sort out my reclaims against the Halifax. I was not happy and asked for a decision by the F.O.S., my first reply was money that was owed for bank charges,this was settled and money will go back into my card account due to it still being in debt. My second claim was for PPI,this again went to the Ombudsman, today i got a letter saying bank of scotland (Halifax) will as a good will gesture, repay all PPI payments debited from my account,and will pay back intrest on all payments taken, also pay 8% interest on the total amount. Again it will be paid back into the account,the amount offered is not known by me,and will only be made known once i accept the offer. How can i accept an offer of unknown amount. I will write to Oasis and inform them that i will not sign anything until i know the amount. I will then sign the required form. After that, i will have to pay Oasis for their time, which is around 34% of total reclaimed. This will be hard to do due to unemployment. It would have been better if i had dealt with this myself,instead of using a company,i would then not have to worry, about how to pay the companies costs.

ikkle87

Hi guys sorry if this is a really stupid thread but I have tried to look for the answers and can't find them all.

1) I originally put in a claim with Halifax almost 2 years ago, they said no and I signed up for Claim 2 Gain to claim my charges back - do i still have to go through claim to gain or can I do it myself?

2) To claim through financial hardship do I need to resubmit a request for statements to know the full amount. and pay i think £10?

3) is there a template letter to send the bank regarding resubmitting a claim due to financial hardship?

TIA x

Ex-Spendaholic

Hi

1. I've no idea what Claim2Gain is so I can't advise on that. My assumption is that it is some company who take a percentage. If so bin them, you can do this yourself.

2. You should be able to access some of your Halifax statements via online banking. If not phone Customer Relations on 01977 627358. They can order up a list of your charges for you. They didn't charge me for this.

3. As the Halifax already know you wish to claim it would be worth giving them a call. I have found the Customer Relations nice to deal with. I know that is a surprise given that I have had nothing but grief with Halifax staff in the past. Just mention to them that you wish to have your claim reviewed in light of financial difficulties. See what they say. I had just send ordinary letter 1 for my claims and they themselves decided to pay out without me mentioning hardship.

Good luck

Edinburghlass_2

ikkle87 wrote: »

Hi guys sorry if this is a really stupid thread but I have tried to look for the answers and can't find them all.

1) I originally put in a claim with Halifax almost 2 years ago, they said no and I signed up for Claim 2 Gain to claim my charges back - do i still have to go through claim to gain or can I do it myself?

2) To claim through financial hardship do I need to resubmit a request for statements to know the full amount. and pay i think £10?

3) is there a template letter to send the bank regarding resubmitting a claim due to financial hardship?

TIA x

First of all you would need to check what you signed regarding this company doing your claim for you as they will have your permission for the bank to deal with them regarding your claim and you would need to cancel this with the bank. The company are likely to have a cancellation charge for work already done on your case, this will be in the small print somewhere. If you don't cancel this company and you continue yourself then you may find the company will still be entitled to whatever percentage you agreed with them for your claim.

As you can read from andrewman's post he, and others, have ended up in the position of having to pay company fees even if the company didn't bring the claim to a final conclusion and if the amounts claimed go towards paying debts held by the bank then the company fees still need to be paid.

ikkle87

Thanks for that. Can't cancel C2G as they will charge 4 hours at £85 an hour.

weenerbunny

I... have a bit of a problem.

Early 2007 I decided to try and reclaim my bank charges, but elected to do it through a company called Claim It Back (I think).

They started the process for me just fine, but then of course the test case went on hold. I heard from them early this year with an email message updating me on the situation and haven't heard from them since.

I think I would qualify for the hardship exemption and wanted to tell them but... cannot find their contact details. And their website doesn't seem to exist, or perhaps they renamed it.

Is anyone else reclaiming through these guys and could maybe pass on their contact details?

samfrench32

I am also using this same company and the service I got when I called last was a bit troubling.
They are all foreign staff when there used to be all english people, I am worried that this company as it could not make much money due to the test case has been sold on. I have two claims ongoing with them one for Barclays and one for Lloyds.
Icalled them about two weeks ago to speak to them about the new hardship criteria, they sent me a form which I have already filled in.
Bit concerned also not really sure what to do now.
Sam

Ex-Spendaholic

I know nothing about such organisations so am not the best person to advise, I'm sure someone with knowledge will come along soon.

However have you paid these people in advance? Do you have some sort of contract with them?

If you can walk away from them without it costing you, I would. They do nothing more than what you can do yourself ie send a few letters.

luckster28

Edinburghlass wrote: »

This why using a company is the worst thing possible as if you have any debt with the bank or on credit card then any monies reclaimed will be put towards that and as you have found to your cost you are now owe the fees charged for the work done. I'm afraid it will be in the small print of the contract you agree to and all I can suggest is you try and borrow the money to pay them before the £150 is added on. Having said that this seems an excessive amount of money and I would check the small print to see if you agreed to such a high admin amount.

just spoken to i-smart and they have agreed a payment plan of £25 a month for 6 months to pay off the £150 I owe, dropped the odd £3 as well!
To be fair they were extremely nice and accomodating when I told them about my predicament. Just a shame the initial letter wasn't!