£80 charges because atm lied !

Reaper

Something else to bear in mind is the banks are currently being forced to repay excessive bank charges as they are only meant to charge you what your actions have realistically cost them. I have to say charging you £30 each time the card was used certainly sounds excessive to me. In the current climate I'm surprised the banks are still trying this on.

Have a read of Martin's article on Reclaiming Bank Charges.

mikk

We took a letter into Abbey yesterday addressed to the branch manager, but apparently so many customers are claiming back charges that they've set up a department at head office just to deal with them. We got a signed and dated receipt and requested a reply within 5 working days. I will update in due course. Although we want his matter resolved, (in our favour obviously) I would be inclined to hedge the bet, ie. withdraw all money form the account appart from 1 pence, before the penalty charges are deducted. Ok, but that would put her in the red again resulting in more charges?
1. I have read something about 'unauthorised lending', would this apply to the above scenario?
2. When an account is 'in dispute' it is frozen, including charges, is it the bank that declares this or can we invoke this state on the account?

mikk

We did withdraw the money (apart from 9p) as its her only income, she needs it more than Abbey! checked the balance today and (no) suprise they've applied the penalty charges putting the account overdrawn again by £79.91, which will increase daily with interest. We will now open an account at another bank before anymore money is due to be paid in. Could anybody answer the above questions?

Dylanwing

:T
I am sure some of the Bankers here will disagree, but well done! This case highlights exactly why the Banks need a massive slap to reduce their charges to a more realistic level.

I hope it works out well for you, as your GF needs the £80 much more than Santander.

mikk

UPDATE: Its nearly 2 months now since Abbey received our letter, yes they did reply initially in the 5 working days I gave them but it is obvious they are now stringing this out. The last statement remained static at £79 od, good we thought at least they've frozen the account as there is a dispute, today another statement arrived saying they were charging another £20 for still being overdrawn! She is now getting worried, while I suggest they are trying it on - a friend has claimed back over a £1000 in 2 or 3 weeks from Bank of Scotland, so why are Abbey being Ars*oles? Apparently they are introducing new rules and charges for overdraughts that will apply from the 10th of September, are they trying to spin it out 'till then? We visited our local branch today but the robot on the desk couldn't help at all. I suggested that that they should not be applying charges to an account that is in dispute, she dissagreed. Who's right?
Lastly, we all know bank charges are inflated in relation to the man hours (or minutes) that it takes to deal with them. So can I not charge them for my time when I write to them, say £20 a letter, not unreasonable.?

natweststaffmember

You can if you sue them in court as the N1 form allows you to claim for expenses such as postage and time. Banks do not freeze accounts if you write to claim charges back. They will however not be dealing with cases until the conclusion of the test case of which they are a signatory, however SUE THEM. They are right, an account in dispute means that they should not apply a default to it nor send it for debt collection. It does not stop charges i am afraid.
As I said SUE THEM.

MarkyMarkD

If you use an ATM from another bank, it may show as the "available balance" your available balance - not surprising, eh?

If you have a £300 overdraft limit, and £7 in your account, it would show £307 because that's how much is available to withdraw.

I'm not sure if that's what happened in this case, but it may be and this may be a helpful comment for others.

At your own bank's ATM it will probably show both balances - mine certainly does.

Paul_Herring

MarkyMarkD wrote: »

If you use an ATM from another bank, it may show as the "available balance" your available balance - not surprising, eh?

If you have a £300 overdraft limit, and £7 in your account, it would show £307 because that's how much is available to withdraw.

I'm not sure if that's what happened in this case, but it may be and this may be a helpful comment for others.

At your own bank's ATM it will probably show both balances - mine certainly does.

You over simplify. If at the start of the day, according to the ATM (ignoring any pending DD/SO's) you had £307 to withdraw/balance in your account (without knowing the balance,) and you spent £300 at Tescabury's, and then went to a cash machine 5 minutes later, you'd still have £307 to withdraw. You then withdraw £300 believing you have it to spend.

You're now £600 behind what you thought you were, and £300 in debt, which the bank will happily charge you for....

daveyjp

Paul_Herring wrote: »

You over simplify. If at the start of the day, according to the ATM (ignoring any pending DD/SO's) you had £307 to withdraw/balance in your account (without knowing the balance,) and you spent £300 at Tescabury's, and then went to a cash machine 5 minutes later, you'd still have £307 to withdraw. You then withdraw £300 believing you have it to spend.
quote]

Not always the case with Abbey - from my experience as soon as you use the debit card in store it reduces your "balance available", but "account balance" remains the same. On Saturday my balance was about £120, went to two stores and spent about £100. Went to another store and tried to spend another £25, but transaction was declined. Quick call to telebank to check balance and shuffle some cash and 5 minutes later the transaction went through.

Paul_Herring

davyjp wrote:

Not always the case with Abbey

Don't count on this behaviour. Always maintain your own 'balance' be it in your head, in a diary, on a notepad, whatever. Do not rely on the bank to tell you how much money you have to spend. Whatever number they come up with, it will be wrong more often than it will be 'right.'