Mistake from Santander has made my account default

StuartJCooper

Hi,

On Tuesday of last week, I contacted Santander due to my inability to access my account to transfer money out of it. On contacting them, i was told my account had been closed due to a 'conversation i had had with them in November 2016'. According to them, the conversation that had taken place was along the lines of, 'I had given my husband permission to talk to the bank as I had health issues and was spending too much money on QVC'. I do not have a husband. I did not have health issues in Nov 2016. I do not know what QVC is. This conversation had apparently led to charges being placed on my account, which in turn led it to default.

The account in question is a Student Current Account - I have been making regular payments of between £50-100 since my graduation in July to repay the overdraft of £1500.

Having had a conversation with the complaints department, Santander admitted they had made a mistake in my account and that the 'default' was a mistake. Their current 'solution' is to open a second account to re-pay the overdraft of the first account, which would then be closed properly. They say they will also look into revoking the 'default'.

This 'default' has had financial ramifications in my life that I did not even realise were due to it. In March 2017, I purchased a car on a finance agreement - on purchasing this, i was told that I had a bad credit rating and would need to pay back a larger amount than originally planned. I assumed this may have been down to the fact that I had a student overdraft that i was paying back - but am now aware that it must have been because of the 'default', which ruined my credit rating.

My question is - am i within my rights to demand compensation from Santander? They have broken the Data Protection Act in allowing someone else to access my account, and i do not know how much private data of mine that they may have given out. Also, the mistake that they have admitted they made in 'defaulting' the account has had financial consequences for myself - can i claim this back from them?

I am really unsure of where i stand here but i believe that i must be entitled to some form of compensation, because as far as i am concerned, Santander have broken the law and affected my finances massively.

Apologies if this is in the wrong place.

Any help would be massively appreciated.

Candyapple

Yes you are entitled to compensation from them.

You will need to show them how the default has adversely affected your financial standing. One example of this would be the car finance. I have no idea how much it would be worth, at rough guess probably between £100-£250 because you took the loan out 3 months ago so they may calculate the difference between say a loan with APR of 20% vs a loan with say APR of 6%.

Make sure you put all of this in writing and demand that they remove the default from all 3 of your credit files (Experian, Equifax and Call Credit) and title your letter with 'Complaint'.

[Deleted User]

Have they actually allowed someone to access your account - or is it an admin error in the notes on your account? Who do you believe has been given information on your account.

What did your statements show? Did the fees note show on there? Did you receive a notice of default? Or was the address changed on the account?

It will be difficult to prove that the default led to a high rate on the car loan. But subject to answers on the above, you may be able to get a goodwill gesture.

forgotmyname

Did they actually give any of your data away though?

Could be someone phoned and told them to close an account and they clicked your account to close by mistake?

Affected your finances massively. What interest rate could you have got if your credit file did not have a default on it?

You can demand anything you like, what you get at the end of the day is likely to be totally different.

If they have affected your finances massively then put the figures down and make your complaint.

But wording is as the above post is not likely to get the results you want.

You will need to show them how and why you have lost money.

Saying they have broken the law without proof they actually gave your data away wont wash. You need proof of what exactly happened.

StuartJCooper

zx81 - Thanks for the response. It is unclear on their side whether someone has actually accessed the account or whether it is an admin mistake. Completely understand that if it is simply an admin mistake then there is nothing i can do in terms of compensation for data loss - but i would still pursue the financial effects that it has had on myself. I've received no correspondence from Santander in relation to the charges or the default, nor have they made any effort to contact me in this time.

When they revoke my 'default', will my credit rating go back to normal? I am worried about the ramifications of this on my credit rating in the future as i was planning on looking at moving house in the future, something that i would not be able to finance with a poor credit rating.

forgotmyname - Without having the files in front of me i could not tell you the exact interest rate that i am paying on the car finance, but i do know that over the course of the contract i will be paying £2500 more than i would have if my credit rating was what it should have been.

[Deleted User]

If they remove the default, it will not appear to lenders.

It may or may not change the credit rating that a CRA gives you - but that is a fictional number so can be ignored. The accuracy of the data is all that matters.

Ben8282

I am having trouble in understanding quite what exactly has happened here and why it took you so long to notice anything was wrong.
You say that you attempted to access the account last week to transfer money out of the account. You also say that you have been regularly paying between £50 and £100 into the account to repay the overdraft.
You say you believe the default was showing on your credit files in March, as it must have been if it was affecting your ability to obtain credit at that time.
If all this is a result of something which occurred in November, resulting in the account being closed, how come you never received any correspondence requesting repayment of the overdraft, advising you of the closure of the account and other similar correspondence.
How come you never checked this account that you were making payments into and which you knew was overdrawn, for over six months then suddenly decided to access it to transfer funds out of it? Did you not think to even check receipt of the payments that you were making into this account?
The actual default appears to have happened very quickly following this conversation back in November, but why would this conversation have led to a default? How can this conversation have resulted in 'charges' being added to your account? What sort of 'charges'? For how much money?
Even if the caller had requested closure of the account, it is highly unlikely Santander would have closed an overdrawn account without discussing arrangements for repayment of the overdraft.
How were you making the payments into the account? What was happening to the payments? This is several months during which presumably some of these 'regular payments' were being made to a defaulted, and therefore presumably closed, account.
What was the actual reason for the default. Exceeding overdraft limit and failing to repay on demand or what? The reason stated by you 'I had given my husband permission to talk to the bank as I had health issues and was spending too much money on QVC'. is not a valid reason for defaulting the account.
Have you actually checked your credit files and seen this default? With which CRA? What is the actual date of the default?

takman

StuartJCooper wrote: »

zx81 - Thanks for the response. It is unclear on their side whether someone has actually accessed the account or whether it is an admin mistake. Completely understand that if it is simply an admin mistake then there is nothing i can do in terms of compensation for data loss - but i would still pursue the financial effects that it has had on myself. I've received no correspondence from Santander in relation to the charges or the default, nor have they made any effort to contact me in this time.

When they revoke my 'default', will my credit rating go back to normal? I am worried about the ramifications of this on my credit rating in the future as i was planning on looking at moving house in the future, something that i would not be able to finance with a poor credit rating.

forgotmyname - Without having the files in front of me i could not tell you the exact interest rate that i am paying on the car finance, but i do know that over the course of the contract i will be paying £2500 more than i would have if my credit rating was what it should have been.

They have obviously made a mistake by not contacting you.

But you really need to start being more responsible with your finances. You should have been checking this account at least once a month to make sure the payments were being received and there were not charges/problems/fraud etc.
Also you seem to never check your credit reports even after a car finance company tell you there is a "problem". This is something you should do immediately and the three main can be checked for free through various websites:

-Noddle
-Clearscore
-MSE Credit Club