Stop Press - View On Oft/bank Announcement

telephone_man

So are you saying that we should not put our requests in until further notice.

I have just received my charges from Abbey (£950) and I was about to send the letter requesting it back.

What should I do?

Knackered

debs81 wrote: »

to knackered

credit card claims are still ok. its just the straightforward bank charges who are having their cases put on hold due to test. luckily for me i did my bank account first and am now tackling my credit cards.
you are still ok to put in a claim for MBNA. just make sure that if you are taking them to court that you state it is a credit card charge case.

Excellent, cheers. :money:

debs81

telephone_man wrote: »

So are you saying that we should not put our requests in until further notice.

I have just received my charges from Abbey (£950) and I was about to send the letter requesting it back.

What should I do?

still send them a letter requesting. although the probably wont do anything about it until after the test case, at least you'll be in the queue for your refund. basically if you dont ask you dont get.

aggis_3

Hiya all,

Received our letter from RBOS today regarding the stays.
I was confused as to the 8 week period. We sent our letter for refund of charges on the 13 May, we received our "please wait" letter on the 21 Jun. RBOS's helpline stated that the 8 week deadline started from the date of their letter ie 21 June. and we were too late, when in reality we were within the dates by over a week.

We spoke to the FSA helpline this morning, they stated that
the 8 week dealine started from the date of OUR letter requesting the charges be refunded. They advised us to speak to the ombudsman.

We then phoned back RBOS and when the lady spoke to her manager, the answer still came back, 8 weeks from the date of their letter.
In light of our question they are going away to check
and will come back to us within 5 working days.

IF your dates are close to the mark with the 27th and your 8 weeks. Use your dates and not the reply letter!

Hope it helps someone.

aGGiS

borgbaiter

telephone_man wrote: »

So are you saying that we should not put our requests in until further notice.

I have just received my charges from Abbey (£950) and I was about to send the letter requesting it back.

What should I do?

hi

bear in mind if your claim goes back a few years it will get statute barred when they go over 6 years if you havnt started a court claim.


borgbaiter

k1mmie

aggis wrote: »

Hiya all,

Received our letter from RBOS today regarding the stays.
I was confused as to the 8 week period. We sent our letter for refund of charges on the 13 May, we received our "please wait" letter on the 21 Jun. RBOS's helpline stated that the 8 week deadline started from the date of their letter ie 21 June. and we were too late, when in reality we were within the dates by over a week.

We spoke to the FSA helpline this morning, they stated that
the 8 week dealine started from the date of OUR letter requesting the charges be refunded. They advised us to speak to the ombudsman.

We then phoned back RBOS and when the lady spoke to her manager, the answer still came back, 8 weeks from the date of their letter.
In light of our question they are going away to check
and will come back to us within 5 working days.

IF your dates are close to the mark with the 27th and your 8 weeks. Use your dates and not the reply letter!

Hope it helps someone.

aGGiS

Keep us posted - this would be interesting if the banks admit to this!

gillt_2

gillt wrote: »

Hi toniq!

Well, I waited until 3pm today and no call back from Miss Judd - so I phoned her. Nice young man answered and said she was out of the office all week! He couldn't find any record of our conversation, so had to go through the whole saga again. He promised to make some calls and get back to me by the end of the afternoon. 20 minutes later, a call from a Mr Port from RBS. Although he was very understanding and could hear how frustrated I was (me frustrated? - hopping, spitting, furious more like!), the bank had to blah, blah, blah ..... Said I fallen into a 'black hole'! He said the new letters would be out within 5 days. Told him if I had not received letter by Friday I would call him back. I just feel totally paralysed by all of this. If I had left my students' coursework lying around for 10 days without looking at it, I'd be in the Head's office having my competence as a teacher called into question! How can the bank receive a letter and not even acknowledge its receipt after 1o days?

Must calm down now - I bet my blood pressure's through the roof! This money was supposed to be helping to solve my financial problems - not add to them!

gillt

Well ... had another phone call from Mr Port on Tuesday morning! Said he had been thinking about my case (and others in the same boat), had been on to customer relations and I would NOT have to wait for another letter and should get my money without delay. After several more frustrating phone calls, the money appeared in my account at 1pm today!

Toniq - if you're still reading the forums - many, many thanks for your info about the chief execs care team. That really did the trick and got things moving for me.

Good luck to everyone else still battling. Don't give up!

Gillt

lindilou39

aggis wrote: »

Hiya all,

Received our letter from RBOS today regarding the stays.
I was confused as to the 8 week period. We sent our letter for refund of charges on the 13 May, we received our "please wait" letter on the 21 Jun. RBOS's helpline stated that the 8 week deadline started from the date of their letter ie 21 June. and we were too late, when in reality we were within the dates by over a week.

We spoke to the FSA helpline this morning, they stated that
the 8 week dealine started from the date of OUR letter requesting the charges be refunded. They advised us to speak to the ombudsman.

We then phoned back RBOS and when the lady spoke to her manager, the answer still came back, 8 weeks from the date of their letter.
In light of our question they are going away to check
and will come back to us within 5 working days.

IF your dates are close to the mark with the 27th and your 8 weeks. Use your dates and not the reply letter!

Hope it helps someone.

aGGiS

eeeermmm hang on a minute, the 8 supposed weeks is from YOUR letter not theirs, obviously in all correspondence you allow the defendants at least 14days to respond, and there are going to be a few letters first before you take action, the FOS is out of the question now as I understand, so your only course of action is file a Court claim.....the 8 weeks refers to using the ombudsman if you intend taking court action then it is your timescale not the defendants, so you can do it immediately if you wish.

techspec

debs81 wrote: »

to knackered

credit card claims are still ok. its just the straightforward bank charges who are having their cases put on hold due to test. luckily for me i did my bank account first and am now tackling my credit cards.
you are still ok to put in a claim for MBNA. just make sure that if you are taking them to court that you state it is a credit card charge case.

Have you heared something new.

As of last week, credit cards were also being dragged in and being stayed by the courts.

arism74

I had a court hearing last Tuesday for my Barclaycard credit card charges, where I went and they didn't show up, so I won by default. I've been waiting for the cheque, but today I get a letter instead where they're referring to the OFT case and that my case is on stay!!!

13 August 2007

Dear Mr. M.

Unauthorised Overdraft Charges ('bank charges')

You have referred your complaint about bank charges for determination in Court.

We believe the charges are legal, fair and transparent.

Since you filed your claim in Court Barclays (along with a number of other banks) has now become involved in legal proceedings with the Office of Fair Trading ('OFT') in relation to bank charges which we believe will resolve the legal issues regarding the fairness and legality of your bank charges. You should be aware that the bank will immediately apply to the Court for an order to stay your action until the resolution of the bank's proceedings with the OFT. As a result your case is likely to be put on hold until the outcome of these proceedings is known.

Given this court case we have asked the Financial Ombudsman Service ('FOS') not to proceed with any other case they are hearing until the test case is resolved. The FOS has indicated that as a general proposition it will indeed not proceed with cases which rely on the legal issues being considered in the test case.

We have asked the Financial Services Authority ('FSA') to suspend the normal timetable for dealing with bank charges complaints, and the FSA has agreed to this request subject to conditions that protect your rights.

We will keep you updated appropriately about the proceedings with the OFT. You can also check the latest position on our website at www.barclays.co.uk

We can assure you we have registered and stored your complaint. Please retain your bank records, as this will make it easier for you to support your complaint on resolution of the test case.

Once the legal proceedings between the OFT and the banks finish, we will resolve your complaint as quickly as possible applying the (test case) principles.

As a general matter, we will ensure that your claim will not be adversely affected by the stay of yoru court proceedings.

Yours sincerely
Thomas Hickey

What is this all about?? Are they bluffing? I thought that the OFT story a) does not apply to credit cards, and b) is only for cases that have not started now, not those that have begun in March (like mine)

I've been thinking of a) calling them, b) calling the court, or c) doing nothing and send the bailiffs next Tuesday....

Any other cases, similar thing happened to anyone?
Thanks

P.S. Apologies if something similar has been mentioned on the thread already, I had a look but I can't read all the pages of the thread