Bank smart trying to charge me!

Alpine_Star

HGKelly said:

Hi everyone

I need some help!!

A company call Bank smart, That looked into a PPI claim for me a few years ago. The last i knew about my PPI claim was that i was not entitled to any PPI. Since then i have moved house and have not heard anything from then. Untill a company called MilCollection's emailed me about this, At first i just thought this was just a scam/span as the emails would be going into Junk mail. After the 3rd email this month in sept 2020. I called to see what this was about. This is when i found out about that I owe money to smart bank. I have now emailed both compancys asking for more information. I have asked for contact, brake down of fee's which they allege are payable, explanation of why any fee's are payable when they have failed to secure any refund and where it stated in the T&C.

While I was on the phone to Milcollections, I got told that i must pay or else this will get sent to bailiffs and they have also said tthey can egt in contact with my work place and gets attachment of earning taken from my wages. (i didnt even know this is a thing that they are able to do)

At the moment I so call owe £790, milcollection has asked me to pay £150 for the moment to stop anymore fee's. I have told them I'm going to look into this first as I have no idea what this payment is for. Im not sure what else to do, apart from wait & hear what they have to say.

Im so worried right now as there is no way I can afford to pay this and dont want to pay not knowing what this is for. I do believe that the £790 is extra cost to send over to a third party, but i was not told this in the first place from bank smart that i needed to pay them anything untill 2020 - This claim was done over 3/4 years ago. Anyone else having these problems or know what else i can do!

Bank Smart have been doing this for years. Their MO is to exploit a term in their contracts that they claim permits them to charge for costs for breach of contract - see clause 17 https://www.bank-smart.co.uk/terms_and_conditions.pdf

It's likely that after they failed with your PPI claim, they repeatedly sent you new letters of authority to sign for other PPI claims or packaged bank account claims and when you didn't respond they raised invoices for breach of contract. The thing is that the Claims Management Ombudsman takes the view that each individual letter of authority is a contract in itself so Bank Smart are effectively attempting to charge you for breaching a contract you haven't signed.

MIL Collections  telling you that they will send in bailiffs or get an attachment or earnings order is just scaremongering - they could only do that with a County Court judgment against you.  MIL don't do anything other than send snotty demands and make unfounded threats if you call them. They will however constantly hound you and the 'debt' increases accordingly.

The only way to deal with Bank Smart is to make a formal complaint. In my considerable experience Bank Smart uphold the vast majority of complaints because they know that the Ombudsman won't. But in order to make an effective complaint you need to know what you're complaining about which means either asking Bank Smart for an explanation and the documents they're relying on to justify the charge or making a subject access request.

spiderman2

I had a letter from bank smart saying they are looking into my ppi I have no communication  from them now they say they are going to invoice me  just for sending out a letter what a rip off firm

WM_Lou27

I've received a letter from Bank Smart on Saturday 31st (dated 7th Oct so it's took a while to arrive) along with an invoice for £263.10. I had an email from them last Wednesday but assumed it was junk because I hadn't heard of them before so I presume they have took up an old PPI claim? I don't intend on paying them anything as I can't find any further correspondence with them.  They have a cheek listing out all the costs for letters I've never seen or know anything about. I have emailed and left a voicemail so I'll see what they say when they get back to me, then if not satisfactory I'll do as Alpine_star says and start a formal complaint along with requesting copies off all the so called correspondence they are charging me for.

kazm70

Hi All, I started a separate thread on these sharks.     Same as you WM_LOU27.   I received an email out of the blue on Friday related to a claim I had made with Ascend Finance in 2017 (and which had been settled).    I've emailed them asking for further detail, and will submit a Subject Access Request if required.  If 'their review of my case' ends up with me getting an invoice I will be lodging a formal complaint.  

manicstitcher

Hi, I have had dealings with Banksmart and I haven't had any PPI back and all I keep getting is more letters saying I haven't sent forms back that I haven't received  but I have received an invoice of over £650 which I cannot afford to pay, I thought these companies took their cut after the PPI has been paid. 

[Deleted User]

They do normally, unless you don't provide them with information needed to pursue the complaint, in which case they often have a time-waster fee in the contract.

Ask them to re-send the forms. It will be cheaper at this stage to keep the ball rolling.

Alpine_Star

manicstitcher said:

Hi, I have had dealings with Banksmart and I haven't had any PPI back and all I keep getting is more letters saying I haven't sent forms back that I haven't received  but I have received an invoice of over £650 which I cannot afford to pay, I thought these companies took their cut after the PPI has been paid. 

You need to make a formal complaint to them and if they reject it you can go to the Claims Management Ombudsman.

The Ombudsman routinely upholds complaints about Bank Smart's 'breach of contract' invoices.