A Bankers View, Open Letter To Martin Lewis And His Followers On Bank Charges.

wilf55

the intrest they charge is profit surely if they let me take the money out in the first place they shouldnt charge me for it they shouldnt let me end up in a situation to create any charges the atm shouldnt let me withdraw 110 when i have 100 in the account etc etc cos then they charge me 38 for this they need to update their system otherwise its just a money making scam on their part

pjttlk

We live in Switzerland which has an interesting banking set up, bordering on the parental. It is quite difficult to get overdrawn by accident - there is no cheque system here, and for both credit cards and normal account banking the bank will simply decline your card at the till when you hit the limit.

This seems to be far more honest and transparent than in the UK.

We do get charged - for things like replacement pin numbers, replacement of lost cards and returned direct debits. The banking don't 'charge by stealth' as they do in the UK.

More importantly the charges are never more than 20 Swiss Francs - currently about eight pounds. The simplest way to settle the debate over the 'fairness' of UK bank charges would be simply to check what happens elsewhere in Europe.

By the way, Banker Girl, your colleagues also seem to laugh loudly whenever the Financial Ombudsman is mentioned.

Phaelok

HSBC do not tell you what is coming out of your account the following day, so you cannot plan for it. Direct Debits do not come out on the same day every month, so it almost impossible to ensure you have the money ready. Why would I want to leave money in a current account earning low interest, when it can be in a high interest saving account until needed!!!

Banks can only give you an indication of when payments for d/d' etc have been historically taken from your a/c. Typically this is always on a given date of every month, e.g. the 15th, but if it is claimed sooner or indeed later, the Bank has no influence over that. What it does have influence over is to make the decision to pay these transactions are not at the time that the company apply to the bank for payment.

One day I logged on in the morning, and noticed that I had two direct debits (£12 and £25) coming out which would put me £27 OD, I had £100 in cash with me so i went to a branch near my work place and deposited the money. Only to find out later the next day that HSBC had bounced both payments and charged me £10 and £25 in charges. this is because the payment left my account at midnight, but did not show to me until the following morning. this proves your banking procedures are flawed.

What it proves is that you did not put the cleared funds in the a/c in the working day before payment was due. In the example you have given you would have needed top contact that bank as soon as you put the money in so that the decision not to pay them would be reversed by the operator you spoke to which is normally done as a 'one-off'. If you decided not to contact them, that is your responsibility. You cannot assume that putting funds in the a/c on the same day will guarantee payment of these items. I stress, as I have done on countless occasions, that if this was paid for you and you contacted them on that day, you would not have been charged. It is impossible for 10's, if not 100's of thousands of a/c's to be monitored on a daily to check whether funds will be placed in the a/c or not and override the decision.

When I contacted HSBC they told me I should have rung them, telling them that I had deposited £100 cash. But its on the system instantaneously, why would I. The account had sufficient funds at close of business that day, but still they said it was my fault!

The above answers this.

southernscouser

BANKER_GIRL wrote: »

I would like to have a frank discussion about how your site makes me feel, which is depressed and ashamed. Ashamed for the poor misguided fools your site attracts and the false, undeserved and unnecessary hope it gives them.

Yeah I'm sorry about that. No need to tar everyone else with the same brush though.

Knightowl

I am misguided......!:D

I am also going grey:eek:

Gone to be honest:A

Yet I can remember the days when I once transferred money from a savings account to a current account (and at the same bank) and be told it will take upto 5 days to appear in my current account as I said despite it was at the same bank.
It is instant now .....and if HONESTY AND TRUTH PREVAIL I can post this in an instant......I can purchase online and money leaves my account in an instant........it's authorised in an instant......YET to see things go the other way it still takes upto 5 WORKING DAYS.....and if anybody is still left who believes £30/35 is JUST are living in Bankerland/Wonderland:rotfl: :think:

TRUTH will always out eventually , scum is always on the surface of clarity, it just needs to be washed away.

jonesMUFCforever

Smasher wrote: »

And vice versa..

That has yet to be proved. :beer:

Smasher

ejones999 wrote: »

That has yet to be proved. :beer:

Oh not another one..

Look, all banks have re-structured their T&Cs to say that their charges are a "fee for a service". Here is what the OFT have already concluded about such practices.

OFT_Report_on_default_charges_April_2006 wrote:

Disguised penalties
4.21
The analysis in this statement is in terms of explicit, transparent default
fees. Attempts to restructure accounts in order to present events of
default spuriously as additional services for which a charge may be made
should be viewed as disguised penalties and equally open to challenge
where grounds of unfairness exist.12 (For example, a charge for 'agreeing
to' or 'allowing' a customer to exceed his credit limit is no different from
a charge for the customer's 'default' in exceeding his credit limit.) The
UTCCRs are concerned with the intention and effects of terms, not just
their mechanism.

So unless the OFT now go & publicly contradict & reverse their own previous ruling, yes it has been proven.
Furthermore, given that these new "service fees" are indeed "disguised penalties" it is quite clear what is going on.

To suggest that the charges are anything other than a penalty and that this recent restructuring of T&Cs was for any other reason than to aviod being laughed at in court is either naive or ignorant.

Nathan_Spleen

ejones999 wrote: »

I would't let you use my money without permission so why should posters think they can get away with using the bank's money?

What most banks are saying in their test case defences and elsewhere are that the charges are for ''an informal request for an overdraft'' and the fact that banks allow unauthorised overdrafts to occur, amount to permission.

Smasher

Nathan_Spleen wrote: »

What most banks are saying in their test case defences and elsewhere are that the charges are for ''an informal request for an overdraft'' and the fact that banks allow unauthorised overdrafts to occur, amount to permission.

Once again, these terms were only introduced after the test case was announced because banks knew that their existing T&Cs, which stated that you were not allowed to exceed your overdraft & the charges were to cover administration costs, would have no chance of whatsoever of standing for even a second in court..
As to the legitimacy of their new T&Cs, see my post above.

Nathan_Spleen

Indeed Smasher, which is why it is difficult to accept any of the banks arguments before or after the test case announcement