Owed money by Very - can I charge interest

dazza190574

Not sure if this is the correct place to put this.

To cut a long story short, I am £501 in credit on my Very catalogue account. And despite me requesting the money be paid back to me they have held onto it for five months.

They have for the second time promised to send me a cheque.

As they have held onto my money for five months and I have not had the benefit of it, am I allowed to charge them interest?

They have said that they are willing to give me a £5 credit for the inconvenience. However, I worked out, if I charge them the same interest rate they charge someone if they took out a loan with them, they would owe me £109 in interest.

lovinituk

You can't charge them the same interest rate they charge for loans as you and they haven't entered in to a loan agreement.

You could try asking them to pay the equivalent of 8% annual interest which is the rate you charge someone when taking them to small claims court. That would work out at around £16 for your 5 months but if they say no you either accept it or take them to small claims court to try and get your £16.

Probably easiest just to accept their £5 credit!

wealdroam

Just to add:

You can't suddenly decide to charge them backdated interest.

If you want to start charging interest, then you need to advise them before you start charging them.

bris

You could sue them for your actual losses but since you don't have an agreement to charge them 8% those losses would only be what your current bank would give you if it was sitting in your bank account. My guess is £5 more than covers it.

daytona0

Haha that's epic, it sounds like they've offered you the amount of interest you may expect from a normal bank account! A sort of sly little joke!

Many a time I've been tempted to offer people goodwill gestures based on missed interest amounts. My favourite was some bloke who wanted interest for his £30 which was a month late.... no problem, you can have 50p which is probably more than enough

naedanger

dazza190574 wrote: »

Not sure if this is the correct place to put this.

To cut a long story short, I am £501 in credit on my Very catalogue account. And despite me requesting the money be paid back to me they have held onto it for five months.

They have for the second time promised to send me a cheque.

As they have held onto my money for five months and I have not had the benefit of it, am I allowed to charge them interest?

They have said that they are willing to give me a £5 credit for the inconvenience. However, I worked out, if I charge them the same interest rate they charge someone if they took out a loan with them, they would owe me £109 in interest.

Personally I would be more concerned to get my money back as soon as possible. If the company went into liquidation before you are repaid you might get none of your £501 back. (I am not saying this is likely but the fact a company was slow to repay would raise a concern with me.)