First Trust are on the run....

Polly

HaHaHaHa I'm enjoying this soooo much! Just had a letter from First Trust which I banked with for 15 years but left in 2002 as they ripped me off just once too often. It would appear that they overcharged me on an early settlement fee for a loan I repaid in 1998 and would now like to give me some money back. Nothing whatsoever to do with the 'supercomplaint' resulting in an investigation by the Competition Commission, I'm sure. There appears to be quite a number of customers affected (surprise surprise!) and a helpline staffed by a dedicated team has been set up to deal with the calls. All of you who have been ripped off by them in the past, keep an eye out for the postman....

ooo000ooo

Got one of those letters in my pocket at the moment for a car loan i paid back early in 1996. They owe me £20 Keep on forgetting to phone them between 17.30 and 20.30 to arrange how to give me the money.

jnd

I got one as well for £20. Was a bit wary initially when you can only call in the evening. They can't send you a cheque either. It has to be paid direct into a bank account.

Polly

Thought having to phone in the evening was a bit rich (pardon the pun!) as banks are open all day. The rather snooty person I spoke to said it was because they had taken on a dedicated team to deal with the calls. Equally snootily, I asked in reply if this was because First Trust had overcharged so many people. She didn't like that much...

arkonite_babe

I got one of these too. Well £20 quid better off in my pocket;)

Ginnser

i got one of these also. i want more than the 20 quid, spoke to the manger ther at FT, no longer bank there, never would again.

if you owed them the money, i feel that 8 years on the charge would have risen somewhat with fees and charges !

They should pay a goodwill payment along with settlement

hassle them

IvanOpinion

As I have said before I can't help but think that anybody that remained with one of the 'big four' probably got what they deserved. The point is that the vast majority of customers must be happy(ish) ... I can't believe that NI people (particularly those from Ballymena ) would be stupid enough to remain with them when there are so many other choices. Why is it that people will spend hour-aft-stress-inducing-hour complaining instead of a nice stress free hour with a free cup of tea changing bank/building-society.

However, having visited the vent board I am not sure that there is a good bank considering that I have seen complaints about Abbey, Nationwide, Lloyds, Barclays, Egg, Cahoot, Smile, Halifax, Yorkshire, A&L etc. etc. ... maybe it is true ... we are a pack of whingers who sign up and agree to T&C and then as soon as we break our side of the deal we complain when they do exactly what they told us they would do in the first place!

I just get the feeling that the 'big-four' are going to be the ones that will NOT lose out of any judgement.

ivan

Polly

I agree that they'll probably not lose out too much financially as they have so many ways up their sleeve of ripping their customers off. However, all the bad publicity surrounding overcharging, not to mention a certain bank robbery, has made the NI banks the butt of everyone's jokes. Its a long way from their ultra-respectable position in society just a few years ago.

chunter

Great to see the NI banks shown up for what they are - a bunch of thieves.
I left FT 10 years ago because I was overdrawn £2 for 1 day - the day before Christmas Eve. They wanted to charge me three months for transaction charges. I handed over cheque book, cards, and shut the account there and then.
Arrogant, stupid people. I Have been with Abbey since and have never had a problem.
In fact, they gave me £20 recently because I Hadn't been overdrawn.

Incentives, not punishments. Works for most people.

IvanOpinion

chunter wrote:

Great to see the NI banks shown up for what they are - a bunch of thieves.
I left FT 10 years ago because I was overdrawn £2 for 1 day - the day before Christmas Eve. They wanted to charge me three months for transaction charges. I handed over cheque book, cards, and shut the account there and then.
Arrogant, stupid people. I Have been with Abbey since and have never had a problem.
In fact, they gave me £20 recently because I Hadn't been overdrawn.

Incentives, not punishments. Works for most people.

Hi Chunter
Flamin heck £20 for NOT being overdrawn ... I must have a word with them ... I have never been overdrawn yet (despite them raising my overdraft limit on a regular basis) ... how on earth did you wangle that???

I do notice that the earlier part of your thread though does highlight the usual pattern and reasons as to why people are disatisfied with 'the big four'. The customer makes a mistake/mis-calculation and the bank enforces the rules laid out in the T&C agreed between it and the customer. The golden rule is that if you do not want to be charged then don't go overdrawn ... not even by 1p ... because YOU agreed to the charges when YOU signed the T&C

Ivan

Polly

You are right of course but these days, the customer is king - or in other words, keeping the customer happy is good business. We have come to expect better treatment from our banks and this 'all or nothing' attitude is not acceptable to most people.