Please help with reclaiming HSBC bank charges.

Stevie_Palimo

mazy_m wrote: »

Well they were as he asked them to reduce it and then they sent him a letter saying if he wanted to increase it again he would be credit checked. Then they upped it again months later.

You can always opt out of increases on credit cards easy enough, The other part here would have been to pay off x amount and then slightly reduce the card limit in increments that suit the card holder ie:- 5000.00 limit pay off 500 and drop it to 4500.00 until it is down to manageable amount.

The onus of spending on the cards falls squarely onto your partner who must take responsibility for his own actions here and accept the fact that he spent the money and also agreed to the terms and conditions when he took the card out.

mazy_m

I don't see how the advice on this is very helpful when it's quite judgemental. Thank you to those that gave the advice about keeping it true to the financial hardship as this will be helpful and this is the sort of advice I asked for. I certainly didn't ask for any opinions about how my partner has handled his finances I asked for advice about how best to approach HSBC about this and now have it.

In all honesty I don't really care if any of you want to defend the bank legally or anyway. I see more so now that they are a business and only care about making money. They don't care when people are having issues. I know both of the other banks I'm with seem to have a bit more humanity and so I will recommend one of them to him.

They have been irresponsible and when we send them the information, dates and summaries we have we shall see what they say. We are not wanting something for nothing. Ideal situation would be any further fees would be frozen and maybe even a bit back.

dunstonh

I don't see how the advice on this is very helpful when it's quite judgemental.

Nobody is making judgement. Remember that we have no emotional attachment to this for either side. You are emotionally attached to it. We see the FOS cases and read their publications. It does not mean we can guess outcomes correctly every time as there are always things we dont know or cant see when it comes to forum posts. Plus, banks can be a bit scattergun in their responses sometimes giving rejections when you think it was nailed on and upholding where there is no reason for them to do so.

In all honesty I don't really care if any of you want to defend the bank legally or anyway.

See what i mean about emotional attachment? You see it as defending the bank whereas we are just stating what the position is.

I see more so now that they are a business and only care about making money. They don't care when people are having issues. I know both of the other banks I'm with seem to have a bit more humanity and so I will recommend one of them to him.

Banks tend to be quite good nowadays when they know that it is genuine hardship and not just someone with a consumer spending lifestyle. They used to be pretty awful at it on all counts. However, it is still difficult for them to know unless they are told or can spot obvious signs. However, most of these things are electronic and human eyes dont get to see things unless they are steered towards it. They have software but that will never perfect. Human interaction is usually best.

A credit limit of upto £5000 is small. if you started to get into £10k+ then you may have a case but it is all relative to income.

They have been irresponsible

Your partner has been irresponsible. The bank just allowed him to be so. Most likely because they were not aware of the situation. It sounds like you were not really aware of the scale of it until later on if we look at what you have said.

Ideal situation would be any further fees would be frozen and maybe even a bit back.

Which is why we keep saying you should focus on hardship. That is a goodwill gesture by the bank. You want the person at the other end to be on your side. You want them to picture the troubles you have and to sympathise with you. You dont want to irritate them by harping on about how irresponsible they have been when they haven't. You want this person on your side. So concentrate on hardship and paint that picture for them to see.

Nasqueron

Just FYI banks send letters before increasing credit card limits allowing you to reject the limit increase if your control of spending means you would just run up more debt.

If you think about it, that behaviour shows why your consolidation loan would not work - he'd pay off the cards and then just run them up again, just as he ran up the increased spending limit.

-taff

mazy_m wrote: »

Hi all,

So my partner has a bit of a habit of not paying things on time which obviously has an impact on his credit rating. Usually we'd end up OK as I was always able to get a decent 0% deal of some sort to resolve the situation. However as my wages have drastically decreased in a new job they won't seem to give me these good deals anymore.

So it comes out that he got himself in a bit of a sticky situation and is paying large amounts in interest alone each month.

These are your own words. They paint a picture of someone who is not good with debt and you are protecting him by using your own credit avenues. If you want to help him, help him to budget as he's clearly spending beyond his means.
Transferring debt from one 0% card to the next doesn't make the debt go away unless he stops spending what he doesn't have.
Upping a limit on a CC doesn't mean he must spend to that limit.

Once you've helped him [again?] with this, I really would point him in the direction of learning to budget properly, however you/he decide to do it.