santander problem

cath000

posting on behalf of my sis.

banks with santander, was doing some internet shopping, decided to phone up and check balance (all purchases had gone thru no problem) santander told her she was over drawn, even tho she hasnt got an overdraft with them?????
also was told that for every transaction she went overdrawn by they would be charging her £25!
can this be allowed, when she hasnt agreed to any overdraft?
also how can purchases go thru if the money wasnt in the account? Surely it would decline as in a shop?


should add that when she asked if she had an overdraft on the account she was told no, but had still become overdrawn??
thanks in advance

Wywth

cath000 wrote: »

posting on behalf of my sis.

banks with santander, was doing some internet shopping, decided to phone up and check balance (all purchases had gone thru no problem) santander told her she was over drawn, even tho she hasnt got an overdraft with them?????
also was told that for every transaction she went overdrawn by they would be charging her £25!
can this be allowed, when she hasnt agreed to any overdraft?
also how can purchases go thru if the money wasnt in the account? Surely it would decline as in a shop?


should add that when she asked if she had an overdraft on the account she was told no, but had still become overdrawn??
thanks in advance

Your sis presumably accepts the terms of the bank account?

If not, she should stop using it and close the account, certainly not spend money she does not have. :cool:

cath000

Its just confusing as if there is no overdraft in place how can money possibly come out of your account, and it wasnt money she didnt have it was just for some reason not in the account when it should have been.

Blackpool_Saver

that's how banks make money, they aren't doing us a favour

cath000

really what the root of my question is, is

would you not have to have an agreed overdraft/overdraft limit with the bank before they give you one or start taking charges?

if anyone knows the answer, Id be grateful thanks

Wywth

cath000 wrote: »

really what the root of my question is, is

would you not have to have an agreed overdraft/overdraft limit with the bank before they give you one or start taking charges?

if anyone knows the answer, Id be grateful thanks

When you spend money you don't have (or even if you do have it but it's not in the appropriate account), then you are requesting an overdraft from the bank.

bengal-stripe

cath000 wrote: »

.....doing some internet shopping, decided to phone up and check balance (all purchases had gone thru no problem)

It might be a good idea, to check the balance before going on a spending spree.

Just a thought.

cath000

thanks for the helpful answers (some), as I have said, I wouldnt expect transactions to go thru if money wasnt in account and as I have stated my sis expected her money to be in there. if there was no money in an account and somebody bought something in a shop the card would be declined. I thought the same would go for online.

Mike_Piazza

I've had a slightly similar issue with Santander..

you'll probably read this and say I'm a silly boy, but I returned
home today to find a letter from Santander that said I had gone
into an unarranged overdraft and owed them £165.78.

This was a complete surprise as I've never knowingly gone into an overdraft on any account and haven't used that account since I opened a 1st direct account last year.

Logging in I saw that I'd been charged £5 per month fee because when switching my bank account for salary payment, I was no lonver meeting the $500 per month minimum paying in fee. I received no notice of this, or that I was being charged.
On ringing the Santader helpline, I was told that they only send a letter once the charges have gone above £100.

Seeing as the account was pretty much unused in the time since september 2011, when the £5 monthly charge started, I was disapointed that Santader didn't have a system set up to send a letter or email. Its reasoning is that it's up to the customer to check the online statements (no paper copies). OK, I admit that this must have been in the small print and I'm at fault, but come on Satander!

So I wanted to flag this up so noone else suffers the same fate.
Also, reluctantly I paid off the outstanding balance as I didn't want it to get worse. I had a horrible feeling that this was negating any right of appeal, but the fees were starting to go up in amounts vloser to £100 rahter than £5.

Santander 'agreed' to stop the fees for January - to which I said I wouldn't have paid them anyawy. If anyone has ideas on whether I've got a hope of challenging the whole thing and getting my money back I'd love to hear. Otherwise, I'll get my money's worth by using this as an example of Santander's rubbish customer service and hope the negative PR hurts it! Obviously it won't, but I'll feel better for doing something.
cheers

meer53

Everyone knows that Santander customer service is dire. Don't think another example will make much difference. But in Santanders defence, they've not done anything wrong here have they ?

You could request a refund but i wouldn't hold your breath.

dunstonh

can this be allowed, when she hasnt agreed to any overdraft?

Yes. By making purchase when there is no money in the account to meet them, that is effectively a request for an overdraft.

also how can purchases go thru if the money wasnt in the account? Surely it would decline as in a shop?

If the transactions are below the floor limit for checking balance then they would go through.

The bottom line is that your sister spent money she didnt have by abusing the card facilities given to her.