Yeh Nice One Martin .......... Not

michael1983l

right ok, there is some people out there that are weak willed and will just run into their overdraft anyway and then it gets to the stage where they constantly live off it. There is no point in this as you get charges about 12% on average for overdrafts. So if thats a "responsible" measure the person has to take to stop that happening then so be it.

As for the direct debits, I semi agree but at the same time disagree. Most companies now charge if you dont pay by direct debit so every penny counts, and if you pay them manually you are always setting yourself up for problems, say you forget to pay which can happen to anybody, or if you come ill and cant pay for some reason.

You say odd case in regards to genuine charges, yet I think there is many cases where the behaviour can be excused, say you loose a job, or the dog needs an operation, you end up on long term (legitimate) sickness, if your placed into a position where its either feed your family and get a charge or starve. Car accidents, deaths in the family and funeral expenses,

I could go on forever and a day with legitimate circumstances and they happen all the time. Fair doo's if you get paid enough money to have a reasonable savings account or insurances but many people live on the breadline with todays wages and simply cannot afford to taske those measures.

And anybody that has ever been in that circumstance knows that those charges are hard to get rid of once they start snowballing. Some people cannot afford to go without £28 and when they cant there is something they cannot pay the next week/month andf it snowballs from there. If you had truley been in that situation you would be sympathetic and understand that it is not always irresponsibility that leads to these situations, in fact I'd go as far to say that a suprisingly high percentage of people were put into the situation even though they did eveything they could to not be in it.

dmdevlin

reads like the banks have heard so much about this site, that they have started posting on it............:rotfl: lmao

Edinburghlass_2

rog2 wrote: »

Something sounds a bit 'dodgy' here, Richt.
1. No creditor can petition for your bankruptcy (which is what a statutory demand is the precursor to) for a debt of less than £750 - Assuming that Lloyds are saying you owe more than £750, but less than £855.94, then they are MOST unlikely to petition for your bankruptcy, as the initial cost to them is likely to be far more than the alleged 'debt' and they will have NO guarantee of getting it back.
2. If you are claiming charges of £855.94 from Lloyds, then this puts the 'debt' in dispute. No DCA should be trying to threaten you over a 'debt' which is still in dispute.
3. A statutory demand is, normally, issued after all other means of collection, including CCJs have been tried. Have Lloyds obtained a CCJ for this amount?
4. Many Debt Collection Agencies attempt to 'frighten' their 'prey' by sending out documents that look like official documents, in the knowledge that most people are ignorant of their rights and will readily pay up, thinking that the next stage will be bankruptcy. This practice is, in fact, illegal.
What is the name of these 'people'?

Bishop investigations & security services Ltd - Airport house, Purley way, Croydon, CR0 0XZ

Registered office: 20-22 bedford row, London WC1X 4JS
Company no. 5622811

The bank I work for don't have call centres but I would suggest you write a letter for the attention of the Branch Manager and post it to the branch address on your cheque book. If you explian your situation and request they refund you the charge considering the amount of business you ahve with them, I'm sure you will get a refund. I think these call centres are just being inundated with everyone requesting refunds, they do not have the capacity to look at each individual case whereas your branch manager will be able to process a refund quickly. This is the troubel with banks using call centres - its not as personal as dealing with your loacl branch manager. Alternatively, visit your locaal branch and request an appointment with the Customer Adviser / Branch Manager and then you can request a refund face to face. This is the reason the Bank I work for do not use call centres - they actaully encourage cutomers to contact their loacl branch and deal direct with the people who know you best.
Might be time to consider a change of bank! Good Luck

Try the Main Site, MSE is about way more than the forums, Loans and Banking.

And if you actually read Martin's article on Reclaiming Bank Charges....

The best route is don’t get charged in the first place

Earlier I used the analogy that, if someone tells you they’re going to punch you before doing it, it doesn’t make it lawful. While that’s true, a sensible precaution would still be to get out of their way.
Similarly, it’s best to behave defensively when you deal with your bank. It’s far better never to have to face charges in the first place than to try and reclaim them. Remember a bank’s job isn’t to look after you, it’s there to make profits for shareholders.
This site is all about the best ways to deal with your cash; first do an adequate budget, have the right bank account, monitor how much you’ve got in it and don’t spend beyond your means. This site’s weekly Money Tips e-mail and MoneySaving articles should help.
Finally, if you get a bank charge for the first time, rather than trying this fight, just call up, apologise, tell the bank you’ve got a good record and politely ask for a refund. Often it will give it.


Graham,

You certainly don't articulate yourself as a twenty six old fella. You come across as old fashioned with ancient morals.

Anyway,

People being charged unlawfully have been subsidising banking for all those who never get charged. Now all of a sudden it's on the other foot and those who 'might' now start having to start paying their fair share don't like. So who do they blame?

Thats what it all boils down to. The banks turn everyone against each other and people fall for it hook line and sinker.

HSBC didn't introduce a charge for bank accounts because of bank charges being reclaimed. They did it because they are greedy barstewards who think they can get away with it, and while people spend all their time fighting each other on here instead of fighting the banks they are counting record profits.

So what your basically saying is "please, please, please keep accumulating bank charges everyone, because I NEED my free banking"

Graham you seriously need to get out more. Twenty six, self employed and comfortable??? Me thinks your a lonely old man.

Peace

Taffyfella wrote: »

Graham,

You certainly don't articulate yourself as a twenty six old fella. You come across as old fashioned with ancient morals.


Graham you seriously need to get out more. Twenty six, self employed and comfortable??? Me thinks your a lonely old man.

Why? Because he's financially dependant and isn't stupid enough to try to live beyond his means?

Jealousy isn't an attractive quality btw

Taffyfella wrote: »

It annoys me Graham to see you subtley belittle people on this forum...

You write concisely and intelligently and not everyone can get their point across as well as you can.

AND that is the reason for the abuse.

Ooohh, that's ok then! :rolleyes:

Taffyfella wrote: »

Graham,

You certainly don't articulate yourself as a twenty six old fella. You come across as old fashioned with ancient morals.

So are modern morals better than the ancient ones?:rotfl: More like modern morals are not morals at all; they're just 'me, me, meisim'!

upthewall_2

michael1983l wrote: »

As for the direct debits, I semi agree but at the same time disagree. Most companies now charge if you dont pay by direct debit so every penny counts, and if you pay them manually you are always setting yourself up for problems, say you forget to pay which can happen to anybody, or if you come ill and cant pay for some reason.

You say odd case in regards to genuine charges, yet I think there is many cases where the behaviour can be excused, say you loose a job, or the dog needs an operation, you end up on long term (legitimate) sickness, if your placed into a position where its either feed your family and get a charge or starve. Car accidents, deaths in the family and funeral expenses,

many people live on the breadline with todays wages and simply cannot afford to taske those measures.

And anybody that has ever been in that circumstance knows that those charges are hard to get rid of once they start snowballing. Some people cannot afford to go without £28 and when they cant there is something they cannot pay the next week/month andf it snowballs from there. If you had truley been in that situation you would be sympathetic and understand that it is not always irresponsibility that leads to these situations, in fact I'd go as far to say that a suprisingly high percentage of people were put into the situation even though they did eveything they could to not be in it.

Couldn't have put it better myself:T

Graham_Devon

LINZILOU wrote: »

I work for a Bank and spend day after day contacting customers who have exceeded their overdraft limits/ had items bounced etc to invite them in to review their finances and hopefully stop any further charges occurring. It is amazing the number of times I have been told "I've not got time" or "What's the point, you've already charged me now!" Yet, these are the people now inundating the Banks with letters demanding their charges back! Why are these people not embarrased that they ahve made such a bodge up of managing an account taht they ahve paid thousands of pounds in charges? How do these people actually get through life - its hardly rocket science - live within your means, open those bank statements and READ THEM!!! Most bank charges are pre-notified at least 16 days in advance so WHY have they gone on and on for 6 years??????

I can understand one or two charges but how do these people who have claimed back thousands of pounds in charges actually manage their finances? A lot of the banks insist on disclaimers being signed to say that you are not entitled to any further refunds so my question is "are these people going to take responsibility for their finances or are they simply going to incur charges again?"

As for the "parachute accounts" people are being told to go and open incase their bank decides to close their account - its not as easy as it seems. Firstly most banks will ask you to provide 3 months up to date bank statements from your existing bankers before they will allow you any accounts with an overdraft / cheque book / debit card. In the bank I work for, if there is an unsatisfactory conduct (eg: charges, over overdraft limits etc) we will decline the application as this is not the sort of customer we wish to take on. If you tell the bank that you do not hold a bank account, this is classed as a false declaration and may result in fraud prevention agencies being informed as your existing bank account will show up on the credit reference search.

I would like to see more advice being given on this site about how to manage your finances properly and maintain a bank account free of charges rather than just telling people its fine to run up £5000 of bank charges because you just send a letter and its all refunded.
I would also like to point out that the bank I work for is hardly mentioned on the "charges successes" forum as we work by the policy - if you're being charged then something is SERIOUSLY wrong with the way you manage your finances and we prefer to deal with that issue rather than just refund and let it happen all over again.

Its about time we stopped blaming the bank and took some ownership - its YOUR name on the bank account - its YOUR wages going in and YOUR bills going out and if YOU are overspending then YOU need to change too!

Here here. I have though, asked for this twice, once when I had a personal response onboard by Martin and followed it up asking for this advice, instead of just how to charge. Sadly, it was ignored.

It would certainly be a step in the right direction if you had to read how to avoid charges in the first place or Martin gave some advice on this.

Graham_Devon

Taffyfella wrote: »

Graham,

You certainly don't articulate yourself as a twenty six old fella. You come across as old fashioned with ancient morals.

Anyway,

People being charged unlawfully have been subsidising banking for all those who never get charged. Now all of a sudden it's on the other foot and those who 'might' now start having to start paying their fair share don't like. So who do they blame?

Thats what it all boils down to. The banks turn everyone against each other and people fall for it hook line and sinker.

HSBC didn't introduce a charge for bank accounts because of bank charges being reclaimed. They did it because they are greedy barstewards who think they can get away with it, and while people spend all their time fighting each other on here instead of fighting the banks they are counting record profits.

So what your basically saying is "please, please, please keep accumulating bank charges everyone, because I NEED my free banking"

Graham you seriously need to get out more. Twenty six, self employed and comfortable??? Me thinks your a lonely old man.

Peace

You can think whatever you like. Point is, you lowered to abuse. :T

Theres people like michael who will have sensible discussion on the issue and then people like you who prefer to lower to abuse and attack me for being semi succesful in life...

Hmm, speaks volumes.

Quote from yourself:
Also "people not educating themselves" are you one of these people that sit there and read endless paragraphes of T&Cs? It's up to the individual if they want to educate themselves on the complexed banking system. Why should they?? After all, an a/c is opened well before you even read the T&Cs unless you want to sit at your branch for three hours reading through befor you sign!!

Yes, i do read the main parts of the T&C's in any contract. It's what your legally bound to. You don't have to sit a your branch, you can read them online. Wouldn't be very succesful being self employed if I didnt understand a contract. Similarly, wouldnt be very good with finance if I didnt understand the contract of where I chose to hold my money.

Taffyfella

Graham_Devon wrote: »

You can think whatever you like. Point is, you lowered to abuse. :T

Theres people like michael who will have sensible discussion on the issue and then people like you who prefer to lower to abuse and attack me for being semi succesful in life...

Hmm, speaks volumes.

Quote from yourself:
Also "people not educating themselves" are you one of these people that sit there and read endless paragraphes of T&Cs? It's up to the individual if they want to educate themselves on the complexed banking system. Why should they?? After all, an a/c is opened well before you even read the T&Cs unless you want to sit at your branch for three hours reading through befor you sign!!

Yes, i do read the main parts of the T&C's in any contract. It's what your legally bound to. You don't have to sit a your branch, you can read them online. Wouldn't be very succesful being self employed if I didnt understand a contract. Similarly, wouldnt be very good with finance if I didnt understand the contract of where I chose to hold my money.

It annoys me Graham to see you subtley belittle people on this forum...

You write concisely and intelligently and not everyone can get their point across as well as you can.

AND that is the reason for the abuse.

Need_More_Money_2

Taffyfella wrote: »

It annoys me Graham to see you subtley belittle people on this forum...

You write concisely and intelligently and not everyone can get their point across as well as you can.

AND that is the reason for the abuse.

!!!!!!?!?!?!

:rotfl:

Graham_Devon

Taffyfella wrote: »

It annoys me Graham to see you subtley belittle people on this forum...

You write concisely and intelligently and not everyone can get their point across as well as you can.

AND that is the reason for the abuse.

I didn't realise we were in a school playground? That's the kind of things a child / teen picks on. Not a grown adult (which I'm assuming you are).

Guess you claimed lots of charges back?

upthewall_2

Taffyfella wrote: »

It annoys me Graham to see you subtley belittle people on this forum...

You write concisely and intelligently and not everyone can get their point across as well as you can.

AND that is the reason for the abuse.



Taffyfella. I see your point and stand behind you;)

GD and pinkfluff we have had our discussion and that is done now, however you do really need to look at the overall situation. You are intelligent people, if you are being overcharged for your borrowing or banking then there is always someone else on the market with a better deal...and free banking!! I believe that reclaiming charges will be a short term fix and the banks will find a way to fight back, but they ARE putting people into poverty. Your business could easily go down the tubes as many small and successfull businesses do, you shouldn't be so quick to judge!!!