Santander took charges from pending cheque?

Sarahjohn

Hi, I deposited a cheque for £720 on Friday the 15th of march at 10am. I was told it the money would show up on my account but I would have to wait 4 days for the cheque to clear.

I'm in financial difficulty at the moment, I am relying on the cheque to pay off debts and loans which I currently owe to get me back on the straight and narrow. I have had no heating for 5 days and ran out of the bare essentials 2 days ago.

I use santanders telephone banking service to check the balance of my account, yesterday it stood at an overall £700 and I was overdrawn by £105 due to debts.

Yesterday I bought the bare essentials from the local shop using my debit card to feed both myself and my son. I checked my balance this morning and my account balance has gone from £700 to £615 and I am overdrawn by £118 because of my visit to the shop yesterday.

My cheque hasn't cleared yet but santander have taken u arranged overdraft charges from the cheque that hasn't cleared. £115 worth of fees! Are they allowed to do this? Are they allowed to take money which isn't guaranteed as mine yet? If they are allowed to take fees from this money that I do not have why can't I? I would have avoided the hefty charges.

So from £720 cheque to £700 to £615.

Is this right that they are doing this?
How can they take money from a check that hasn't cleared?
If they can take my money that I haven't received, why can't I?
I do not understand.

YorkshireBoy

Presumably the £115 charges were pre-notified, so you knew they'd been charged to your account on that day?

Just on your terminology, they don't "take" charges...they simply debit your account with the amount.

Sarahjohn

No they did not notify me that they were taking the £115 from my account. I have emailed them, with no response as of yet.

YorkshireBoy

Sarahjohn wrote: »

No they did not notify me that they were taking the £115 from my account.

Not even by e-mail (a condition on several of their accounts)?

Reading between the lines you're regularly incurring charges, so how are you normally notified?

Sarahjohn

This is the first time I have had charges from santander. I understand they are supposed to notify you, then take the amount, but I have had no correspondence from them, post, email or phonecall.

So I am bewildered. I understand the are charges for an unarranged overdraft but I was und the impression, that they take money from your current balance, as the £720 that was on my account wasn't available, as the cheque had not been cleared.

So shouldn't any fees that they charge me be taken from my actual balance?

grumbler

The balance doesn't matter. They just apply the charges regardless and if there is no money the account gets overdrawn.

Cass85

Hi Sarahjohn I am really sorry to hear about your situation. Have you spoken with your bank to explain you are in difficulty and regularly in charges which are leaving you in a bit of a cycle? They should be able to help. They havent drawn against your cheque before the funds are available. They have debited pre notified charges from your account as suggested. There are two ways you are normally notified in this case from my experience (i bank with them too). In writing with your statement or if your paper statements are off you get an email. Do you have online banking? Check the secure messages. To help in future, you can set up text alerts via their online banking to notify you if you are close to your o/d limit or about to go overdrawn so if you are racking up charges this could help you to manage your account so you are in the know about what is going on. The fact howver that you cannot afford bare essentials is worrying. Id advise you to speak to StepChange asap. They will give you free financial advice to help you sort your finances and hopefully get out of your present situation. Good luck

YorkshireBoy

Sarahjohn wrote: »

So shouldn't any fees that they charge me be taken from my actual balance?

Like I said in post #2, they're not taken from any balance (running, available, or whatever), they're simply debited to your account.

If that creates, or worsens, an overdraft balance then it doesn't matter...they're still debited.

In other words, and to address a point raised in your OP, they're allowed to worsen your position but you're not!

mulronie

If you hadn't paid the cheque in, the charges would have been deducted anyway.

The cheque issue is a red herring - focus your attentions instead on why you're racking up such high charges in the first place.

platterfish

Santander notify you of charges on the previous statement, I believe. Did you opt for online statements only, have you read them to check if theres a charge due.

Do speak to them about it though, they may agree a waiver for some if it's your first time. And ask them about ways to prevent charges in the future etc.

psychic_teabag

Sarahjohn wrote: »

I use santanders telephone banking service to check the balance of my account, yesterday it stood at an overall £700 and I was overdrawn by £105 due to debts.

I don't understand what you mean by having a balance of £700, yet being overdrawn by £105. An account can only have one current balance, can't it ?

Unless it's distinguishing between balance and available funds, or something, but then in that case the difference should have been £720 (the uncleared cheque), unless you have other pending cheques, or money earmarked for withdrawal but not taken, or something.

I have an arranged (but unused) overdraft facility with natwest. They rather annoyingly tend to show the "available" balance as the true balance plus the available overdraft, which is very annoying. So clearly it is possible for an account to have two balances, as it were. It's just not clear to me what you mean by the two different numbers you quoted.