Reclaim Unfair Bank Charges article discussion Part II

konradsk

I'm currently unemployed and have been for about 2 months now, and my payments are starting to catch up with me. I have seen here that I may be able to reclaim overdraft fees from the last 6 years, of which I probably have a significant amount of, certainly more than £300's worth.
The only charges I will be claiming for is overdrawn fees, of which I was charged around £25 at a time.
I have made the first step and asked for a 6 year backlog of just my bank charges and Barclays have issued it to me, but they said that I will NOT be able to claim anything due to the courts new ruling. I didn't just say "okay then" I still requested that the charges list be sent to me, in the hope that maybe it was just a change of ruling and the call centre's have to say that to scare or put people off.

I've downloaded the template letter fromt this site, and I will fill it in once I receive my charge list.
Do I still have a claim, or is it not worth the trouble because of the new rules? (I do not know what the ruling was, my knowledge on this subject is only what I have read from teh claims help here)
As mentioned I have just recently hit unemployment so my status may be considered hardship.

OneLonelySock

beaujolais-nouveau wrote: »

From personal experience, I can say that Lloyds TSB charge per transaction, even if they refuse several on the same day. They can take out the equivalent of an entire week's wages in charges in one day, if you have that many DD's refused on one day.

I found out the other day that as I was classed by Lloyds as suffering from financial hardship Lloyds they could offer me control service free which gets rid of my daily charges and limits my returned dd's to 3 per day.
Not much help, but it's a start.
If I wasn't in hardship, surprise surprise, they'd charge me £10 a month for it.

fatiboombati

Hello all!

I'm looking to reclaim the bank charges from Natwest (which is roughly arround £1200), but since the result of the court case, I'm wondering if it's still worth putting in a claim?

Cheers.

Superly_Vince

fatiboombati wrote: »

Hello all!

I'm looking to reclaim the bank charges from Natwest (which is roughly arround £1200), but since the result of the court case, I'm wondering if it's still worth putting in a claim?

Cheers.

I've come back to ask the same question. Any advice would be grately appreciated.

esmerellda

Write to your bank asking for it back but dont go as far as putting any claim in court at the moment. We do not recommend any one starts a new court claim at this time.

esmerellda

OneLonelySock wrote: »

I found out the other day that as I was classed by Lloyds as suffering from financial hardship Lloyds they could offer me control service free which gets rid of my daily charges and limits my returned dd's to 3 per day.
Not much help, but it's a start.
If I wasn't in hardship, surprise surprise, they'd charge me £10 a month for it.

Sorry can we just confirm , if you are in hardship Lloyds waive the £10 a month fee for having the control account ? Do they still charge the £10 per bounced transaction (up to 3 a day) ?

esmerellda

konradsk wrote: »

I'm currently unemployed and have been for about 2 months now, and my payments are starting to catch up with me. I have seen here that I may be able to reclaim overdraft fees from the last 6 years, of which I probably have a significant amount of, certainly more than £300's worth.
The only charges I will be claiming for is overdrawn fees, of which I was charged around £25 at a time.
I have made the first step and asked for a 6 year backlog of just my bank charges and Barclays have issued it to me, but they said that I will NOT be able to claim anything due to the courts new ruling. I didn't just say "okay then" I still requested that the charges list be sent to me, in the hope that maybe it was just a change of ruling and the call centre's have to say that to scare or put people off.

I've downloaded the template letter fromt this site, and I will fill it in once I receive my charge list.
Do I still have a claim, or is it not worth the trouble because of the new rules? (I do not know what the ruling was, my knowledge on this subject is only what I have read from teh claims help here)
As mentioned I have just recently hit unemployment so my status may be considered hardship.

Legally AT PRESENT the charges are unable to be considered for fairness by the OFT. We're working on it.
In hardship you should still write and ask for your charges back they are unfair and extortionate expecially when imposed on people suffering hardship. Have a read of the FSA banking regulation called BCOBS - part 5.1 and also google The Lending Code and have a read of section 9 a bit of which pasted below, and word a letter around that with your income/expenditure asking for help.


"Dealings with customers in financial difficulty

BCOBS 5.1.4 01/11/2009 Principle 6 requires a firm to pay due regard to the interests of its customers and to treat them fairly. In particular, a firm should deal fairly with a banking customer whom it has reason to believe is in financial difficulty."
[FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Lending Code - Section 9: Financial difficulties[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, sans-serif]137. Subscribers should be sympathetic and positive when considering a customer’s financial difficulties. Although there is an onus on customers to try to help themselves, the first step, when a subscriber becomes aware of a customer’s financial difficulties, should be to try to contact the customer to discuss the matter. This applies to both personal and micro-enterprise customers.*[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, sans-serif]138. Personal customers should be considered to be in financial difficulty when income is insufficient to cover reasonable living expenses and meet financial commitments as they become due. This may result from a change in lifestyle, often accompanied by a fall in disposable income and/or increased expenditure, such as:[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]loss of employment;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]disability;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]serious illness;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]relationship breakdown;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]death of a partner;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]starting a lower paid job;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]parental/carer leave;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]starting full-time education; and[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]imprisonment[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, sans-serif]
[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, sans-serif]139. Financial difficulties may become evident to a subscriber from one or more of the following events:[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Items repeatedly being returned unpaid due to lack of available funds;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Failing to meet loan repayments or other commitments;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Discontinuation of regular credits;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Notification of some form of insolvency or court proceedings;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Regular requests for increased borrowing or repeated rescheduling of debts;[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Making frequent cash withdrawals on a credit card at a non-promotional rate of interest; and[/FONT]
• [FONT=Arial, sans-serif]Repeatedly exceeding a credit card or overdraft limit without agreement.[/FONT]


Income and Expenditure forms and addresses are here.

[FONT=Arial, sans-serif]http://www.legalbeagles.info/forums/showthread.php?t=18427[/FONT]

Former_MSE_Wendy

This thread is now closed. Please see the new discussion thread.