Reclaim Unfair Bank Charges article discussion Part II

MSE_Jenny

The News of the World is doing a story on complaints to the Financial Ombudsman.

The journalist is looking to interview people who’ve complained to the ombudsman about any of the following three areas: payment protection insurance (PPI), bank charges and credit card charges.

If you would like to take part, please send me a private message, including your name and the best telephone number to get you on.

Thanks very much.

deana14

Keep up the letters and calls, I am 5 months down the line now. Call Customer Relations every day - have written to all the team members (it seems) of the CR department - last letter to Peter Jackson if he ever reads letters. Has been a long and drawn out process just to warn people who are starting out.
I have filled out 2 common financial statements and endured 45 minutes on the phone to Money Management Team - another 0845 number I asked them to call me back as 0845 unlike what they advised to me is NOT free from BT landlines!! Unless anyone out there knows different. THEY WROTE TO ME AND SAID THAT THEY WOULD NOT DEAL WITH ME ANY FURTHER IF I DID NOT SPEAK TO MM TEAM - I WROTE BACK SAYING I DO NOT TAKE KINDLY TO THREATS!
They will delay, drag their heels and make it difficult saying letters not received even faxes when you have the reciept that went to the number they gave you. They lie constantly.
They offered me 3 months no charges - WOW thanks but seen as I have no money that is very BIG of them - words are cheap and advice from them both Customer Relations and the Money Management Team will not pay bills and keep a roof over my head.
To my mind they ask for proof - i.e. court letters, eviction notices etc. but still do nothing, they ask for all this information from you but still offer nothing, it does not help. It is a one way street - do not trust them at all.
I would rather not have had free banking and paid a monthly fee than had at times some months £350 in charges taken out which frankly compounded the situation and made it worse. There was never and help offered.
Be ready for a big fight and take to FOS service but keep on top of them also calls etc. as all of their post is sent 2nd class and I am not sure about anyone else in Hardship (after losing job) every second counts when you have no money coming in - I am waiting on nearly £9k of my hard earned money over the years but remain postitive and tell you all not to give up and let them win no matter how small.
Thanks to Martin, the team and this website it has opened my eyes to alot and is a constant source of encrouragement.
Hope the advice helps any newbies - fight the good fight and stand up for your rights it IS your money and was hard enough to earn, do not give up.

natweststaffmember

I have responded to you but they have offered you something under the FSA Waiver ie 3 months no charges and interest. The difficulty is establishing whether there are priority debt arrears(mortgage/rent, council tax, utilities) and whether the charges contributed to them and how much they did.

Laini

My OH has spoken today to yorkshire bank and went through our Income/Expenditure.
I sent a hardship letter approx 8 weeks ago.
They have said there is a letter in the post listing what we will be getting as an interim payment in the next 2 weeks.
approx 700squid of 2K charges
I will post up exactly what they are offering once I get the letter

Laini xx

Amatrix

natweststaffmember wrote: »

You are being helped by friends which means that it isn't showing as financial hardship. If you have priority debt arrears(mortgage/rent, council tax, utilities) and are not repaying the arrears then you may have a case. However the redundancy was a few years ago which means that although you may be struggling as a result they would see it as being sufficient time to budget for that lifestyle change ie loss of job. Do you have any credit card charges to reclaim?

I do have lots of charges for cards I can claim but haven't kicked any of them off yet as I don't want to have to try and cope with lots of claims at once. Are these easier to reclaim? I thought Egg were just as stubborn as Halifax. There is some mortgage arrears and secured loans, but the rest are cards and unsecured loans. I have had council tax arrears but have managed to get up to date thanks to the borrowed money. My friends lend me money so I can eat and travel to work basically.

Amatrix

deana14 wrote: »

I have filled out 2 common financial statements and endured 45 minutes on the phone to Money Management Team - another 0845 number I asked them to call me back as 0845 unlike what they advised to me is NOT free from BT landlines!! Unless anyone out there knows different. THEY WROTE TO ME AND SAID THAT THEY WOULD NOT DEAL WITH ME ANY FURTHER IF I DID NOT SPEAK TO MM TEAM - I WROTE BACK SAYING I DO NOT TAKE KINDLY TO THREATS!.

Well I suppose I may as well bite the bullet and speak to their patronising money managers. I deals with large sums of money and budgets as part of my job - the reason I was in this fix is still from a redundancy years ago when I was paying hundreds of pounds a week in fees and charges when getting just £50 a week in benefits. The interest and charges built up the debts and all these years later I am still trying to pay it all off. The old story of being charged forty quid to bounce a £9 direct debit that would have put me 6p overdrawn for 24 hours while a cheque cleared was common incidence back then and a common occurance on this board by the sounds of it.

My letter from Customer Relations quotes 01977 627538 as a phone number. Call this and see if they can put you through to MM Team rather than pay 0845 rates. I will try this myself I think.

Orford

Calls to 0845 and 0870 numbers are included in BT Calling Plans (at the weekends with the Unlimited Weekend Plan; during the evening and at the weekend with the Unlimited Evening and Weekend Plan and anytime with the Unlimited Anytime Plan).

http://bt.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/bt.cfg/php/enduser/cci/bt_adp.php?p_sid=WGolapnj&cat_lvl1=345&cat_lvl2=350&cat_lvl3=361&cat_lvl4=1083&p_cv=4.1083&p_cats=345,350,361,1083&p_faqid=12732

gillespie0001

Orford wrote: »

Calls to 0845 and 0870 numbers are included in BT Calling Plans (at the weekends with the Unlimited Weekend Plan; during the evening and at the weekend with the Unlimited Evening and Weekend Plan and anytime with the Unlimited Anytime Plan).

OR use saynoto0870! As I'm a new user I cannot post a link, but it is just saynoto0870 and dot com

indytim

The Halifax have taken over £3000 from me in bank charges over the past 8 years. This has been a time when I have suffered a great deal of financial hardship and been made redundant twice. During this time I wrote to the Halifax on several occasions asking if they could show some leniency relating to their bank charges while I got back on my feet, but their response was basically 'tough, it's not our problem'. I have learnt the hard way that the happy, customer friendly image they convey through advertising is nothing but a lie shrouding the truth.

Anyway, this year I decided enough was enough so, using on-line guides to help me, I set about claiming the past six years charges back; which amount to roughly £2500 (a small fortune to me). I have a £900 overdraft with the Halifax which is infuriating, as it's necessity is a direct result of their charges.

They fobbed me off with automated response letters but I continued through the motions until I eventually came to the point where involving the courts became my only option, so I did. After submitting my claim to the court I received documentation back stating 'The defendant says that the amount you are claiming has been paid (see attached Form N9B)' and there were details of the 'test case'. As not a penny of my bank charges has not been paid back to me this seemed ludicrous and actually offensive. I was asked to complete a form asking how to proceed and so I checked the box 'I wish to proceed with the claim' and returned it.

This morning I have now received a letter from Northampton County Court (after completing my claim online this is who all the correspondence has been coming from, which I found a little odd as I live in West Yorkshire). It simply reads ...

'I write with reference to your request to proceed with the above case (case number quoted). We are unable to transfer the case as it is an Office of Fair Trading case pending the outcome of the case currently with the High Court.'

Can anyone make sense of this and advise me how I should now proceed? To me, that appears to be drawing a line under my case and informing me that I've failed in my claim. Any help or advice would be very much appreciated. Thanks.

johnlaird1980

i just recieved a four page list of charges which i requested from lloyds tsb
iam just about to add them up , but can someone please tel me what to add and when i use the intrest calculator on this site do you add each charge individualy ,

also i got loads of account charges £4.00 and £5.00 for example

date - 21/09/2001. type - fee. descriptio-account charge cr/dr -£4.00 d/r

i have around about 80 of these account chargers can i add these up

thanks for your help
john