Bank Charges Success Stories II

Good_Girl

Bank: RBS
Amount Claimed: £434
Amount Paid: £420

I claimed the above back for my partner; we started the process approx. 4 months ago. RBS sent his statements very promptly and actually replied to our first letter within the 14 days (but this was to say that they were "looking into it" i.e. stalling!). We sent the second letter 2 weeks ago and received their response yesterday offering £420. We're obviously very pleased as originally we had debated whether he should just ask for his fees to be refunded (£386) or to add on the 8% interest on top (to take it to £434) - we went with the latter and it's literally paid off!

Thank you so much for the advice in both articles and the forums! :j

cambsgirl2

Amount Claimed: 907.51 inc interest
Amount Received: 752.00 amount claimed excluding interest

I had all my statements so sent template letter using calculator from MSE on the 18/04/07 recorded delivery.

Had no contact from Nat West at all until offer letter recieved today.

Many Thanks for this valuable information.

chris-thomas_2

chris-thomas wrote: »

I WON!!!

claim for :- £1440
got £1100

story

phoned for statments got them in a week.
sent letter asking for money back 4th april
got letter 30th may charges fair bla bla
phoned 1st june said they would look at it again. phoned them this morning asking what was happing woman not very helpful so i phoned the fo they said to fill form and send it in so i started to fill it in and thought i would try halifax again! very nice man answered so i explained i was filling in fo form and wanted to know what was happing with my claim. he said he would look and phone me back. 10 mins later phoned back little chat later £1100 agreed! waiting for it to go in my account now and i can pay some bills!

hi again sorry had letter this morning was offered £1200 must have misheard in my excitment! so might even have some money left for a pizza when the bills r paid.:beer:

Baffled

Hello all - early i April I put in a claim to my bank (Natwest) for repayment of my bank charges, amountin to £1469.61. Yesterday I was bemoaning to a friend that I'd not even had an acknowledgement letter from them when the postman delivered the mail. There was a large envelope from the bank and inside was a letter stating that their charges were fair and transparent etc.etc. Turning to page 2, they stated that they had 'reviewed' my case and, as a 'gesture of goodwill' they were going to refund the sum of £1333.39 conditional upon my signing the acceptance form enclosed with their letter. Needless to say, I signed the form in a flash, took it to the post office and got a certificate of posting. Hopefully, they will have received the form this morning, and my bank account will be healthier by this time next week:j :T :beer:

I must say a HUGE thankyou to Martin, without his advice I would not have had a clue how to go about reclaiming the charges, so many, many thanks Martin:D

IferHadaRichMan

Hello everyone...:wave:

thought I'd share this with you as I'm so gobsmacked I still don't know whether to believe it (though reading other posts on here it looks promising...)

Having banked with Natwest since I was about 12 (I'm nearly 24 now) I never had any real problems financially, until I met my (now ex) other half...who developed a teensy weensy (not) gambling problem, a result of which I was always skint until we split last December. I always moaned and was shocked at how much I was charged by the bank for either being overdrawn, returned direct debits, account misuse etc and the ridiculous times at which they would take the charges out (most of my charges were for them taking money out which I had accounted for other direct debits etc I'm sure most people in this situation will know the score here).

A friend of mine from work told me about Martin's guidelines on how to have a go at reclaiming my bank charges, so I thought what the hell I've got nothing to lose, I'll have a try...

I wrote to the bank requesting a list of all my charges from the last 6 years, including a £10 cheque that Martin suggested sending to speed up the process (apparently the bank can charge £10 to give you the information). Shortly afterwards I received the statements in te post - they had to send them in two envelopes there were that many! Anyway I highlighted all the charges I'd had and typed them out, detailing the date, reason and amount I had been charged. Because I used an excel spreadsheet to do this I used the autosum facility to total the amount...I was flabberghasted when it came to a whopping £4735 :eek: I then followed the next step and sent the first letter stating that I basically wanted my money back.

Unsurprisingly I had no response from Natwest, so around a month later (ensuring they had already had sufficient time to respond) I wrote to them using the next template, basically threatening them with court action should I not get my money back. This was around a month ago, and it was only last week that I was debating whether I really wanted to go to a small claims court...it's all a bit foreign to me lol

So yesterday morning I got a two page letter in a large white envelope from Natwest, outlining the terms and conditions of my account and how I should be aware of these and manage my account properly (so by now I'm thinking the're not going to play ball here...) however when I turned over the page it said as a good will gesture and without accepting any liability they were offering me a settlement figure of £4335!!!!! :j I had to read it three times to believe it...they haven't even closed my bank account...all I had to do was sign the attached form and return it...which I did immediately of course...so now I've got all my fingers, toes and everything else crossed eagerly awaiting my money!!

Sorry this is so long winded (thank you for being so patient if you've read this far lol) I just had to tell people on here to prove that it really is worth having a go at reclaiming your charges cos I genuinely didn't think I stood a chance!!

:j :j :j

mrk_3

Bank: ABBEY
Amount Reclaimed: £1348.32 (inc stat interest, court costs)
Amount they paid: £1446.66
The story:

Went through Martins step-by step process up to and including receiving a court date. Summary :

• End Jan07 – requested past 6 yrs bank statements
• By end Feb – had received approx 18months statements and remainder as microfiche printout copies
• 02 Mar – requested full amount of charges +statuary interest to be refunded
• 07 Mar – received standard letter from Abbey Complaints Dept (would take over a month to investigate
• 22 Mar – issued claim via MCOL
• 03 Apr – received 2nd letter from Abbey Complaints Dept : still investigating
• 17 Apr – Abbey files standard defence + claim transferred to my local county court
• 18 May – Receive Small Claims Track court date for end July but District Judge orders Abbey to produce within 28 days full details of bank costs for each and every charge I am claiming
• 7 Jun – Receive offer of full claimed amount + extra interest from date of initial court claim + extra wrongly calculated court costs!!!!! - AWAITING CHEQUE.

So anyone in process / looking to claim – carry on and be patient as it will bear fruit!!

:money: THANKS MARTIN !!!!!

rentawitch

Bank: First Direct
Amount Claimed:2202.20 including interest
Amount offered and accepted:£1,415

I spoke to the bank who agreed to send me the statements that were not available on line. They took about two weeks to send these through. I prepared the letters and sent them recorded delivery on 4 June.

I received an answer dated 6 June on 7 June (with a reply paid envelope!)
offering £1,415 (= 80%) without interest and naturally without prejudice.

I have written back accepting their offer with a letter of my own stating that
my 'without prejudice' acceptance is contingent on the money being paid into my bank account within 14 days.

A good result, I never thought I would see this money again and I get to stay with First Direct who are, in spite of the charges, just about the best bank out there I have found.

Thank You MSE!!

tomilo

Bank: NatWest
Amount Reclaimed: £3655 + £632 interest
Amount they paid: £3655
The story: Paid £5 to Bank DPA for 6 years of statements. Sent two letters (second without prejudice offering to accept without interest - I need the cash!!). No answer so applied to court - acknowledged by Bank but then a letter with offer came yesterday! Fantastic!
Thanks so much
Tom

scottishchick27

Bank: Lloyds TSB
Amount requested: £850
Amount received:£750

I submitted three claims around the middle of April, my account (£650), my OH's account (£850) and joint account (£2500). Got back standard letters so I decided to go to the court for the two smaller amounts. My account needed a small claim so I filed that. My OH, because it was over £750 had to file a Summary Cause. I work in a solicitors office so when the forms came in I sent them to one of the solicitors to serve for me as I was on holiday. When I got back to work I asked him if he'd served them but he hadn't received them. :eek: I went back to Sheriff Clerk and she said I wouldn't have to pay again as she knew I had already paid but I would have to fill in his form again. Spent ages trying to remember what I had written in the first one and filled it in. Next morning he had a letter from LLoyds offering him £750 as a goodwill gesture. Decided to accept. Called them up about my account but they said it had gone to their legal team. :mad: If I'd only waited a couple of weeks I would have had my goodwill gesture too. Nevermind. Called them up about the joint account which has charges of £2500 but they said they have no record of my complaint so I have to wait for 52 days for them to review. At least the ball is rolling now though. Money is in the account from his account so can now afford the MCOL for this one.

SirJuicer

Bank: Nationwide

Amount Reclaimed: £120

Amount they paid: £120


I got charged £120 for 1 letter informing me 4 direct debits had been returned in the space of two days (this never would've happened, has it not taken Nationwide 12 days to clear a cheque into my account, but that's by the by).

Wrote off to them with the standard letter, they replied with all the nonesense of how I agreed to these terms etc.

Downloaded the complaint form from Financial Ombudsman website, filled it in, posted it and within 2 weeks I've got a letter from Nationwide offering me the full £120.

I am currently in the process of getting £489.46 from CapitalOne, at least £300 from Barclaycard (still waiting for the charges they hold on Microfilm) and an unknown amount from Natwest.

Thank you Martin, I'm absolutely over the moon that finally these ridiculous charges are finally being dealt with.