13 and overdrawn!!

Valli

However (without telling the boy) I would be escalating the complaint to the banking Ombusdman about the tone of the letters and the way the banking system has failed here. When your son paid for the goods there must have been some check then that the funds were there, so these should have been 'allocated' to the payment - think they call it pending. The bank have allowed your son to have this account so they are, IMO partly responsible.

samwsmith1

flashg67 wrote: »

My teeanagers have this account and it does say it can't go overdrawn, but I can see how this could happen. A good lesson for your 13 year old though! Even though I doubt Barclays could enforce the debt against a minor, or pass it to anyone else, I'm sure it would be prudent to get the account straight again asap.

The letter will be a 'standard' one - I doubt their systems are able to tell how old the a/c holder is?

McKneff - the teenagers account does give you a debit card on request - guess this is what the OPs child has?

The way my two spend their money - I better keep an eye on the post!

I don't think it would be to hard for them to add into the code that sends the letter something along the lines of:

IF age <18 then
SendUnder18Letter
Else
SendStandardLetter
End If

sounds simple like that but I still shouldn't think it would be to hard to implement it.

Plxply

Valli wrote: »

When your son paid for the goods there must have been some check then that the funds were there, so these should have been 'allocated' to the payment - think they call it pending. The bank have allowed your son to have this account so they are, IMO partly responsible.

This has already been discussed, normally banks only hold the funds for 7 days or so until the authorisation falls off the account. This meant that he spent money somewhere, the money wasn't taken for a while then he went to spend somewhere else whilst his available balance was higher as the payment wasn't taken.

Although I disagree with the wording of the letters, I've had a debit card ever since I was young and occasionally went into an overdraft with HSBC but I always noticed within a week. This is an important lesson for him after all he was the one who spent more money than he had.

I think people often think of a 13 year old as being extremely young when it really isn't (sorry older MSE members ) at his age he can be prosecuted for his actions and it's at the point where he needs to start learning responsibility. After all within a short period of time he will need to start his GCSE's and afterwards decide if he wishes to continue into further education.

AndyinLondon_2

This might help:

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/index/your_world/consumer_affairs/young_people_money_and_consumer_rights.htm#banking_credit_and_borrowing_money

Tremour-88

I would write an angry letter to Barclays, because they're at fault for allowing his account to go overdrawn.

At 13 your son can't be expected to know all the ins and outs of overdrafts etc. and he is at no fault for checking his balance and spending his money, Barlcays is at fault for allowing him to use money when a pre-auth on another payment is sitting there.

AndyinLondon_2

Tremour-88 wrote: »

At 13 your son can't be expected to know all the ins and outs of overdrafts etc. and he is at no fault for checking his balance and spending his money, Barlcays is at fault for allowing him to use money when a pre-auth on another payment is sitting there.

The flip side of that is that if pre-auths never dropped off, you could have one sitting on your card for years, if it was applied in error or duplicated. This is why they expire after 7 days.

The actual overdraft is really nobody's fault. Barclays handling of it leaves much to be desired.

whitewing

What company was he buying from? Why did they not process the payment for so long? I can't think of a single debit card payment that I have made in the last twelve months that hasn't come off my available bal immediately and most nowadays are on the statement much sooner than they used to be.

Plxply

I don't want to seem heavy handed in my previous post, I agree that it's nobody's fault he went into an overdraft. Barclays should have definitely handeled it in a much better fashion, maybe even by calling him and saying that his account is in an overdraft. Unfortunately I assume he just got a stock letter, if I remember correctly from my old contract with HSBC they said they would contact you (if you went into an overdraft) and if you didn't pay it back they would close the account. I definitely would expect a different type of letter sent to an under 18 maybe even a call as they would have his phone number on file.

Simon7685

I have just made an appointment today to sort out one of these accounts with Barclays for my daughter, so find this very interesting reading.

Re Whitewings post #28, You can count yourself very fortunate that this scenario hasn't happened to you in 12 years. It does happen all to regularly, I myself made a purchase on 30/01/12 from my local tesco express store using my Halifax Debit Card - the money was never pre authorised, never taken from my balance and to date not taken from my account. I have had other experiences like this with Santander when I only had a basic bank account. Unless you keep a check on every penny it is so easy for this situation to arise.

Having said that I do not think Barclays approach has been acceptable and I think they are equally responsible for causing the problem. When you are talking about kids having these facilities it is to teach them now ready for later on and as such there should be more stringent policies adopted by the banks.

I think the idea is a great one in principle, teach them to manage their money and use banking services at an early age. Maybe that way when they get to 18 they won't go over the top with it and end up thousands in debt as a result. I had nothing but a Post Office account up until leaving home to go to college in 1983. I was given a new toy, including a cheque book and guarantee card also a guaranteed overdraft and off I went into the big wide world...................
Oh my within 6 months I was up to my eyes in debt, use the card and chequebook spend money I didn't have and all because I hadn't any experience of how it all worked. I wanted a new t shirt to go out in no problem, after all that's what the chequebooks for........

Teach them early and hopefully stop tomorrows young people making the same mistakes as we did. I know I wasn't the only one!

Seriously though I hope you get this sorted out and let us know how it goes.

happymoneysaver1

I'm playing devils advocate a bit here but what is the exact wording of the letter that has got you so upset?

Please understand I have a son myself and although he is yet to hit his school years, anyone or anything that makes him cry or upsets him, instantly makes me go into protective mode without question, regardless of who/what/why etc.

The phrase you have included in your post - "escalating debt can lead to financial difficulty" - is really not threatening but more of a guidance statement. Without knowing what else the letter contained or the exact factual background (minus the emotion) I don't think we can give a fair assesment of the situation.

Martin Lewis has long been campaigning for financial education at school and I think considering we do not have this yet, what you have done by letting your son open an account to teach him financial responsibilty is fantastic (I will be following your lead here!). However, financial responsibilty lies with us as the individual to manage our own account and know what money we have, what money we have spent and what money we have left. If we know we have spent £x on something by card but it has not came off our account, we cannot act ignorant to the fact the bank/retailer has not deducted it from our balance, we should know this - regardless of the timescales. I understand your son is still young in his years and this is something he is not used to and it is easy to see why he would forget/misjudge his balance and why you would look to the bank to be more of a guidance as to not to allow this to happen.

However, this is where I am playing devils advocate (I'm so sorry!)I think you have taken a motherly emotional response and have just wanted to protect your son instead of seeing the bigger picture. As I've said, i don't know the ins and out of the wording of the letter or the overdrawn situation so please don't think I am being negative or unhelpful - I'm just seeing it through my eyes and what my knee jerk reaction would have been.

I agree with some other posters on here (as well as you re taking responsibilty for the debt) but I would let him know that this is what happens in the big bad world of adult money. If he keeps himself up to date with his income/outgoings and keeps himself a wee bit knowledgeable in the world of finance and in the black - outwith a major error on the banks part - he will never receive a letter from the bank again.

I hope that is ok? x