At what point does being cute become fraud

Hooloovoo

forgotmyname wrote: »

The banks allow it so why not take advantage?

I presume politicians felt the same about the rules on their expense accounts.

I can see the OPs point. Clearly the banks do not intend for us to do what we're all doing. We're following the letter of the T&Cs, not the spirit of the T&Cs.

We all know "pay in £750 per month" is intended to be your salary, your pension, etc. Not £250 bounced back-and-forth three times. It's just the banks have no way of telling the difference.

Doesn't stop me taking advantage of course, just like everyone else.

PeacefulWaters

There's complying with the T&Cs.

There's legally exploiting the T&Cs.

There's fraud.

The first two are not illegal.

Iheart

Gromitt wrote: »

I don't need to overpay my energy DD - the energy companies do it for me all by themselves, and are constantly altering the DD saying I've paid "Too much" and then "Too little".

Same here, thats why I switched to OVO.

LittleVoice

carhandle wrote: »

Leaving aside the morality - unless you're absolutely lumping on the overpayments and taking the cash excess repayments every 3 months, that couldn't be worthwhile doing....could it?

I mean, you'll get 5% from a current account so giving up money which could earn that in order to gain 2% cashback surely isn't prudent?

Not a good example. 5% (even when paid gross) is for a year. 2% cashback might be for a quarter (and is not subject to tax deduction), ie 8% in a year.

innovate

M0ney wrote: »

what's the point in insulting people by rushing in to correct any errors you spot?

If anyone feels insulted when an error is pointed out, they should grow up as it is certainly not my intention to insult anyone. In any case, I have the right to express my views, in the same way as you have the right to say someone has the right to post bad spelling, grammar and vocabulary.

Hooloovoo wrote: »

I can see the OPs point. Clearly the banks do not intend for us to do what we're all doing. We're following the letter of the T&Cs, not the spirit of the T&Cs.

We all know "pay in £750 per month" is intended to be your salary, your pension, etc. Not £250 bounced back-and-forth three times. It's just the banks have no way of telling the difference.

The banks all know exactly what is going on (not least from being active on this forum). They also can easily see whether your money comes from an external source or whether you just bounce it between the accounts you have with them. So if they disapprove, they can change their T&Cs. We have indeed seen some tightening up of the rules over the last couple of years - e.g. maximum x accounts per person, x DDs needed, no internal transfers for monthly deposits, limits to cashback etc. They could easily implement further restrictions if they wanted to but they have to strike a balance between attracting customers and putting them off.

Transacting your bank accounts within the T&Cs is neither fraudulent nor deceptive nor immoral nor wrong in some other way.

carhandle

LittleVoice wrote: »

Not a good example. 5% (even when paid gross) is for a year. 2% cashback might be for a quarter (and is not subject to tax deduction), ie 8% in a year.

Yeah, that's why I wrote "take back the overpayed credit every 3 months"

ceredigion

Can I express my extreme gratitude to those fellow contributors who took the time and trouble to correct my spelling.
I would be the first to admit my mastery of the English language is far from the best , I cant spell for adam and I know it . My grammar's not that bad though , certainly seen worse on these boards in the past.
Would like to think my vocabulary is fairly good though. So there must be something going on in this muffled brain of mine. So please don't destroy my delusions. The world would be a boring place if we were all perfect and never made an error ,like some.

ceredigion

Would appear that I'm the only one, who can see the difference in over payment of a utility bill in error just in the general throws of life and the passage I highlighted earlier where there is a deliberate act to deceive for a financial benefit.
Surely just because T&C don't say that you cant do something ,doesn't make it right to do so. There again I may just have a slightly straighter moral compass than some.


P.S I know there's a double negative in there somewhere but hay ho.

Hazzanet

As the banks make it difficult to get any interest on savings, but are giving the best rates to current account holders providing they jump through hoops, then I see no issue with playing the banks at their own game. I'd happily put my savings away in an instant access account at 4-5% if one were offered.

I agree with innovate to some extent that the Ts and Cs are increasingly becoming more complex to try to stop the monthly money shuffles and forcing people to set up DDs on what would otherwise be a dormant account, but needs must.

As for upping a payment to an energy supplier to gain cashback on the DD, I would genuinely say that you're not MSE if you didn't at least consider it. I have a 123 account, but don't use it for the cashback as to be honest, I don't really want regular DDs for bills being paid out of what I consider a savings account to me, nor do I want to split some DDs from one account and others from my main account. That said, if I were using the 123 as a main current account, I probably would overpay the energy companies for more cashback.

Santander are daft enough to pay the cashback, and the energy companies are daft enough to take more than they're owed. Fair enough in my opinion.

castle96

I certainly can't feel 'guilty' for exploiting whatever loopholes are left in their T&Cs. If Sun Life wish to send me a £100 TV for £21 every now and again, great. Same with vouchers/£incentives/interest ...