Reclaim Unfair Bank Charges article discussion Part II

Kimberley

emmastar wrote: »

Hi

I claimed and won my charges back from the halifax in may 2007. Since then i have been charged another £500 in charges but i am on income support. I wrote asking them to refund these charges but they said i signed a form saying i wouldnt claim any more charges. I thought i could claim again as they are taking my income support and child tax credits each time. Help

Em xx

They are not allowed to take from benefit money if that is your sole income.

hpsaucey

NOT SURE IF THIS IS IN RIGHT PLACE JUST NEED SOME ADVICE??
Tried to claim bank charges back from HSBC but were told it was too late as 6yrs had passed fair enough but in the meantime I had been paying debt collector every month for 4 1/2 yrs £10 a month against this debt of £750. I owed £220 and decided to write to bank and didnt pay collector and explained to him what I was doing. ok. finally got letter last year off HSBC in january saying TOOOOO LATE so I told them I wasnt going to pay collector anymore. I didnt hear anything until Dec 2007 when I received a letter from different debt collector[whom i assumed bought this debt] I phoned them as explained situation and they said regardless i had to pay, even though they quoted this debt was from 1997. surely if its too late for me to claim off HSBC its too late for them to claim this off me now for overzealous bank charges which I wouldnt have owed anyway. now getting at least 1 letter every week and 2 phone calls.Have sent a letter on 11/1 to them to explain all of this to them only to get another letter todays saying I have never contacted them and ignoring their letters will only result in further action. they have already stated over the phone that they carn't take me to court for this so what else can they do.??any advice any1

facingthefuture

Sorry this is a bit confusing. Is there any point in reclaiming bank charges now and is there any point in chasing credit card charges?

agnes_2

hpsaucey wrote: »

NOT SURE IF THIS IS IN RIGHT PLACE JUST NEED SOME ADVICE??
Tried to claim bank charges back from HSBC but were told it was too late as 6yrs had passed fair enough but in the meantime I had been paying debt collector every month for 4 1/2 yrs £10 a month against this debt of £750. I owed £220 and decided to write to bank and didnt pay collector and explained to him what I was doing. ok. finally got letter last year off HSBC in january saying TOOOOO LATE so I told them I wasnt going to pay collector anymore. I didnt hear anything until Dec 2007 when I received a letter from different debt collector[whom i assumed bought this debt] I phoned them as explained situation and they said regardless i had to pay, even though they quoted this debt was from 1997. surely if its too late for me to claim off HSBC its too late for them to claim this off me now for overzealous bank charges which I wouldnt have owed anyway. now getting at least 1 letter every week and 2 phone calls.Have sent a letter on 11/1 to them to explain all of this to them only to get another letter todays saying I have never contacted them and ignoring their letters will only result in further action. they have already stated over the phone that they carn't take me to court for this so what else can they do.??any advice any1

you really must get the mods advice on this, there are certain laws which prevent the banks from harrassing you. I am not in a position to give full information, but I know that some of the cleverer people who are more legally adept will help you. :money:

dchurch24

Even if you DID sign something to that effect, which is doubtful - it was probably a 'full and final settlement' of THAT claim, not future ones, they couldn't enforce it. It's the same reason for why, despite people saying "it was in your contract" the charges themselves may not be legal.

The bank does not have the legal right to take away your civil rights (only this government seems to be able to do that ;-) ).

The bank cannot take your only income if it's benefits.

Search for "Right of appropriation".

That's what you need.

spyretto

Natwest online banking made an error showing I had £100 pounds more in my account than I had and so I made two transactions of £25 each that day ( foolishly in hindsight as I should have never trusted their online banking ). It was a Friday. Another scheduled transaction came though that day (£3.99) which also "bounced" the following day. So on Saturday my online banking reverted to the correct balance without showing any new transaction which showed I was nicely over the limit. Could do nothing until Monday. For this little bank glitch - which I can't prove since the system corrected itself after a few days - they're going to charge me £18 mentainance fees + 3x£30 for every transaction that "bounced" = £108.
The lady on the phone would hear none of it but at least she informed me that she'd contact the office to see if there's any chance those charges could be refunded. To my comment that they're ridiculously high and unfair she told me that it's "standard procedure".
My question is: do I wait until those charges are deducted from my balance to send a letter to the bank regarding past charges or should I do it now. Needless to say I'd like those charges to be included in my claim, in fact I wouldn't go down the road of requesting any charges back if they had the decency to remove those charges. But they surely won't.

Tozer

That is not correct. The bank cannot attach charging orders (which are very different to bank charges) to benefits (as they can with earnings) but once the money is in the account, it is just like any other money.

Tozer

Kimberley wrote: »

They are not allowed to take from benefit money if that is your sole income.

Law is in Social Security Administration Act 1992:

187.—(1) Subject to the provisions of this Act, every assignment of or charge on—

• (a) benefit as defined in section 122 of the Contributions and Benefits Act;

• (b) any income-related benefit; or

• (c) child benefit,

and every agreement to assign or charge such benefit shall be void

But banks that apply charges once the money is in the account are not purporting to make an assignment or charge the benefits.

exil

Exactly. And yet people keep on bringing up this old chestnut, which is merely giving desperate people false hope.

Tozer

exil wrote: »

Exactly. And yet people keep on bringing up this old chestnut, which is merely giving desperate people false hope.

Completely agree. Whilst not wishing to be unsympathetic, can people not even do some basic research?