CSA taken payment in error. Now overdrawn with impending bank charges.

ambc

Hi - just after a little advice on how to deal with something.

Basically, my ex wife made a claim against me via the CSA in back August this year, for reasons still unknown to me. We share childcare exactly 50/50 (although I do a little more on a week by week basis), down to us each claiming 1x child benefit each (we have two children) which means she could only claim CSA for the child for whom she receives child benefit.

The CSA, in their infinite wisdom, then advised me to make a claim against her based on our other child, which I did, albeit uncomfortably.

They then did their calculations, which indicated that my ex wife would have to pay me more than I was paying her as her income is higher than mine.

Because of this (I can only assume), she quickly backtracked and decided that using the CSA wasn't such a good idea after all and we cancelled both of our claims before any payments had been made either way. I received a letter from the CSA early November that confirmed my ex wife had closed her case against me and that I was no longer required to make any payments. She received a similar letter for the case against her.

However, while all this was going on, I had opened a new bank account that I was going to use solely for the CSA payments. The idea was that her payment to me would go into this account and my (slightly lower) payment to her would come out of the same account, meaning I could leave it without worrying about having to make the CSA payments. I also wanted to use this bank account as a means of demonstrating the futility and unnecessary admin and government expense of having two parents claiming against each other like this.

Anyway, given that both CSA cases were closed, this bank account has sat dormant for a couple of months - or so I thought!!

I received the latest bank statement this afternoon that said the CSA had taken out a significant sum by direct debit on the 2nd December. And because I had NOT put any money into the account to cover payments (as the CSA told me they'd closed the case and wouldn't take any payments), this sent me into an unauthorised overdraft, and the bank are also going to charge me for the privilege!

So, what I'm asking is whether there is any special procedure I need to follow when asking the CSA for a refund?

And how likely are the bank to agree that this wasn't my mistake and cancel the charges and not send a red mark to my credit record?

Anyone got any idea? Or advice?

Thanks in advance.

ValHaller

If it is a Direct Debit, then go to your bank and do a chargeback under the Direct Debit Guarantee.

YorkshireBoy

ValHaller wrote: »

If it is a Direct Debit, then go to your bank and do a chargeback under the Direct Debit Guarantee.

And if it's a CPA (ie made using your debit card number) then give them the details you've provided here and cite the Payment Services Regulations*, which state they have to put you back in the position you'd have been in had the error not occurred.

This places not only a onus on them to refund both the amount and any associated, consequential fees, but also prevents them from placing a marker on your CRA files.




* You can even cite these if it was a DD, because the DD guarantee (by itself) won't remove black marks from your CRA file.

ValHaller

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

And if it's a CPA (ie made using your debit card number) then give them the details you've provided here and cite the Payment Services Regulations*, which state they have to put you back in the position you'd have been in had the error not occurred.

This places not only a onus on them to refund both the amount and any associated, consequential fees, but also prevents them from placing a marker on your CRA files.




* You can even cite these if it was a DD, because the DD guarantee (by itself) won't remove black marks from your CRA file.

Good general advice, but in this case, the CSA don't report to CRA's

YorkshireBoy

ValHaller wrote: »

Good general advice, but in this case, the CSA don't report to CRA's

I think I've posted a reply to a post I haven't read properly! I must have confused this with another post I'd read this evening. Apologies.


However, I was referring to the bank placing the marker on the CRA files, not the CSA, which was the OPs concern when they said...

And how likely are the bank to agree that this wasn't my mistake and cancel the charges and not send a red mark to my credit record?

YorkshireBoy

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

I think I've posted a reply to a post I haven't read properly! I must have confused this with another post I'd read this evening. Apologies.

Turns out I replied to the 'short version' of events on the credit rating board (where no mention of DD was made), without reading the full version here!


Advice still stands.

CSAworkerx

How long was the case open for? If we assessed your case and time passed, youd have arrears, which we ask pwc's if they would like us to collect these.

ambc

Thanks all - useful advice. Appreciated.

@CSAWorkerx - the case was open no more than a couple of weeks. When my ex wife and myself both called in to cancel our respective claims, we both stated that neither of us wanted any payments to be collected from the other, including any arrears, which would have been negligible anyway.

My initial calculation actually did show a very small amount of arrears, which was a fraction of the total payment you took on the 2nd December. However, I was assured over the phone, and again in a letter, that no payments would be taken. The letter also said that if any arrears were to be collected then you would write to me first. I haven't received any other letters since the one that said the case was closed and no payments would be taken.

Does that make it any clearer?

shegirl

ambc wrote: »

Thanks all - useful advice. Appreciated.

@CSAWorkerx - the case was open no more than a couple of weeks. When my ex wife and myself both called in to cancel our respective claims, we both stated that neither of us wanted any payments to be collected from the other, including any arrears, which would have been negligible anyway.

My initial calculation actually did show a very small amount of arrears, which was a fraction of the total payment you took on the 2nd December. However, I was assured over the phone, and again in a letter, that no payments would be taken. The letter also said that if any arrears were to be collected then you would write to me first. I haven't received any other letters since the one that said the case was closed and no payments would be taken.

Does that make it any clearer?

You would have been subject to payment from the day they contacted you,which will be what csaworker is on about.

It must have been longer than a couple of weeks it was open otherwise they wouldn't have had time to contact you,assess you,inform you of your liability,then the same again for your ex.

Any payment that has been collected would be money owed during that period.Is the date it was taken the date given on the payment schedule you received?

Did your ex definitely tell them not to collect?

It's possible they missed cancelling the DD on time,but it's best to phone them and find out why they took the payment.

Give them a call in the morning,they can be a little slow in changing/cancelling payments.

FBaby

It sounds like you were the victim of different timescales, ie. when she made the claim (you say August), which is when you would have been liable to start paying until the claim was officially closed, and the same with her. A she opened her case earlier, depending on when you then decided to do the same, there would be a timescale when you would have had to pay the full amount and her nothing. Then when she would have paid and so would you, so the credit of what she owed compared to what you owed, until both cases were closed (assuming on the same day).

Whatever you paid in, she will receive, so hopefully, the easiest way to go about it would be for her to transfer the money back into your account and because all is her fault, hopefully, she will agree to pay at least half of the bank fees (really should be all, but that might be pushing your luck maybe?).

Unless you can prove that there were overlaps in all these payments and therefore you do owe nothing, I wouldn't bother with the csa trying to sort out the mess unless your ex is a completely uncooperative and refuse to transfer the money back.

ambc

Thanks, and sorry, I actually missed a bit of info out there.

Her initial claim from mid August was thrown out by the CSA and that case was completely closed as she'd claimed for both children when she was really only eligible to claim for one.

That's when they advised me to make my claim based on one child, because they suspected she'd do the same.

It then took around 6 weeks for them to contact her, at which point she then made a second claim against me for one child.

So, by the time they contacted me again for her second claim, it was around mid October.

It took 2-3 weeks for them to do their calculations on my income (so minimal 'arrears', I guess). At this point, my ex received the calculations and realised that she'd be paying more than I was. She emailed me to say she was closing the case, and we both called into the CSA that day to close our respective cases. We both asked them NOT to collect any payments, including arrears, and I remember them telling me that no payments whatsoever would be collected. I made sure of this because I knew there would be no cash in the brand new bank account to cover them.

I then received a letter a few days later (mid Nov) confirming the case was closed and NO payments would be taken. The letter also said that if they were to collect arrears, they would write to me first.

What I'm struggling to understand is how a letter and a phone call can both confirm that no payments would be taken, then they take one anyway. Huh?

The truth is, my ex will be awkward about returning the money. But that doesn't really bother me. It would be nice to get it back, but it's not going to kill me otherwise.

What I'd really like to do is prevent this from showing up on my CRF as I've been REALLY careful during the last 6 years to keep this squeaky clean due to a bankruptcy 7 years ago.

Do you think I could get some kind of letter from the CSA that explains the mistake, and that I could show to the bank? This is the bit that's worrying me!