Bank account closure without reason

happy101_203

Hi All, 
I received a message from Halifax informing me they will be closing my bank account. I have my salary regularly go into this account have not withdrawn any large amount of money. But Halifax will not disclose the reason why they are closing my account. Any advice on what I could do to find out why?

p00hsticks

Have they given you sixty days notice or are they saying they are closing it immediately ?

WillPS

happy101_203 said:

Hi All, 
I received a message from Halifax informing me they will be closing my bank account. I have my salary regularly go into this account have not withdrawn any large amount of money. But Halifax will not disclose the reason why they are closing my account. Any advice on what I could do to find out why?

You won't be able to find out definitively, they don't have to tell you and typically won't. @Bridlington1 went through this earlier in the year.

Common reasons are:

1. Excessive account opening activity
2. Excessive CASS activity
3. Using personal account for things your bank would consider to be business activity
4. Selling something to someone who pays you using a bank transfer, then the buyer claims you didn't deliver/sold them a dud.

Could any of the above apply to you?

Middle_of_the_Road

happy101_203 said:

Hi All, 
I received a message from Halifax informing me they will be closing my bank account. I have my salary regularly go into this account have not withdrawn any large amount of money. But Halifax will not disclose the reason why they are closing my account. Any advice on what I could do to find out why?

If they have given you 60 days notice of closure, it's usually for commercial reasons. Banks seem to be closing accounts which they feel are not being used in a way they should be. Could be some transactions they don't like, but something has raised a flag. They will never tell you the reason though.

happy101_203

It’s odd because I haven’t done any of the above. I only use the account sparsely and then have my money kept in my account and pay with most things on my credit card, which is then paid off on full via my Halifax main account. 

Bridlington1

First of all I'm sorry to hear Halifax is closing your account. 

The reasons why they could have decided to close your accounts are numerous, it could be opening too many short lived accounts, you may have accidentally broken one of their Ts&Cs, they may simply not like the look of you for whatever reason, the list goes on.

Since November 2022 I've received lifetime bans from 3 banking groups (Barclays, LBG and Metro in that order) and I've never found out the exact reason why any of them have banned me. All I've been able to do is speculate and make an educated guess as to some of the possible reasons. See the link below for details of my LBG lifetime ban, Metro in particular I would argue was much less clear cut:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6433933/lbg-closing-all-my-accounts-on-18th-may/p1

I like yourself attempted to find out exactly why LBG decided to close my accounts, which included branch visits and submitting DSARs to  Lloyds, Halifax and Bank of Scotland in which I requested a copy of all information that they hold on me. The only details about the account closure that I found in the DSARs was that they'd taken the decision to close my accounts and that my accounts would continue to operate as normal until closure.

I doubt very much that you will be able to get the decision to close your accounts reversed, indeed I tried with Barclays and all I got was £100 through the FOS in recognition of the fact that they could've given me 60 days notice instead of closing my accounts immediately.

Therefore all I can suggest is that you save yourself the bother of trying to find out exactly why they are closing your accounts as it is a waste of time. Instead I would de-link LBG from your banking affairs as soon as possible and switch all current accounts you have with LBG to different banking groups before the date they are due to be closed using the CASS in order to save yourself any potential inconvenience if any payments are made into your old account after closure. Also if you haven't already make sure you have accounts with different banking groups in case you have any issues, i.e. frozen account, accounts being closed etc in the future.

wmb194

happy101_203 said:

It’s odd because I haven’t done any of the above. I only use the account sparsely and then have my money kept in my account and pay with most things on my credit card, which is then paid off on full via my Halifax main account. 

Have you received any transfers from individuals? Any deposits from abroad? Crypto transactions?

Ed-1

Bridlington1 said:

I tried with Barclays and all I got was £100 through the FOS in recognition of the fact that they could've given me 60 days notice instead of closing my accounts immediately.

Did this go to an Ombudsman (in which case has the decision been published?)  or was it settled at an earlier stage?

Bridlington1

Ed-1 said:

Bridlington1 said:

I tried with Barclays and all I got was £100 through the FOS in recognition of the fact that they could've given me 60 days notice instead of closing my accounts immediately.

Did this go to an Ombudsman (in which case has the decision been published?)  or was it settled at an earlier stage?

Apologies, I should've been clearer. The matter was resolved at the case handler's stage so never went to an Ombudsman. 

Essentially I opened a Barclays student additions account on 7/11/22 in order to get hold of the rainy day saver. They gave me a lifetime ban on 25/11/22, closing all of my accounts without notice. I made a complaint regarding the account closure in the hope of getting the decision reversed. 

Soon after I noticed Barclays had marked the account as defaulted on two of my credit reports despite the account never having a negative balance for the entire time it was open so made a complaint regarding this (this was later added to my original complaint and dealt with as one). 

In late January I heard back from Barclays who refused to uphold the complaint regarding the account closures and also claimed they hadn't put the default on my credit reports and to contact the credit reference agencies.

At this point I accepted they had a right to close my accounts but was determined to get the default removed.

In May after going back and forth between the credit reference agencies and Barclays for a few months with Barclays claiming the credit reference agencies were showing the default in error and the credit reference agencies claiming that they were only showing what Barclays had reported to them I took the matter to the FOS. Since my original complaint had been made about the account closures the case handler investigated the account closures as well as the default.

When I heard back from my case handler in July I was told Barclays had made me an offer in which they acknowledged that a two month notice period for the account could’ve been issued instead of the immediate closure so offered me £100 for the abrupt closure of my accounts. Since I wasn't expecting to receive anything for the closure itself I accepted this part of the offer.

However Barclays continued to deny that they had put the default on my credit reports until August, at which point the case handler told me that Barclays had arranged a credit file cleanse to remove the default as well as give me the £100 in recognition of the abrupt closure of my accounts. I accepted this offer and the case was closed.

So far though the default still shows on my credit reports so I will likely give it until the end of the month before contacting Barclays again to see why they haven't got round to removing the default.

For further details about the Barclays affair see:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6448593/how-to-remove-an-incorrect-default-from-credit-reports

Ed-1

Bridlington1 said:

Ed-1 said:

Bridlington1 said:

I tried with Barclays and all I got was £100 through the FOS in recognition of the fact that they could've given me 60 days notice instead of closing my accounts immediately.

Did this go to an Ombudsman (in which case has the decision been published?)  or was it settled at an earlier stage?

Apologies, I should've been clearer. The matter was resolved at the case handler's stage so never went to an Ombudsman. 

Essentially I opened a Barclays student additions account on 7/11/22 in order to get hold of the rainy day saver. They gave me a lifetime ban on 25/11/22, closing all of my accounts without notice. I made a complaint regarding the account closure in the hope of getting the decision reversed. 

Soon after I noticed Barclays had marked the account as defaulted on two of my credit reports despite the account never having a negative balance for the entire time it was open so made a complaint regarding this (this was later added to my original complaint and dealt with as one). 

In late January I heard back from Barclays who refused to uphold the complaint regarding the account closures and also claimed they hadn't put the default on my credit reports and to contact the credit reference agencies.

At this point I accepted they had a right to close my accounts but was determined to get the default removed.

In May after going back and forth between the credit reference agencies and Barclays for a few months with Barclays claiming the credit reference agencies were showing the default in error and the credit reference agencies claiming that they were only showing what Barclays had reported to them I took the matter to the FOS. Since my original complaint had been made about the account closures the case handler investigated the account closures as well as the default.

When I heard back from my case handler in July I was told Barclays had made me an offer in which they acknowledged that a two month notice period for the account could’ve been issued instead of the immediate closure so offered me £100 for the abrupt closure of my accounts. Since I wasn't expecting to receive anything for the closure itself I accepted this part of the offer.

However Barclays continued to deny that they had put the default on my credit reports until August, at which point the case handler told me that Barclays had arranged a credit file cleanse to remove the default as well as give me the £100 in recognition of the abrupt closure of my accounts. I accepted this offer and the case was closed.

So far though the default still shows on my credit reports so I will likely give it until the end of the month before contacting Barclays again to see why they haven't got round to removing the default.

For further details about the Barclays affair see:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6448593/how-to-remove-an-incorrect-default-from-credit-reports

Did you get an outcome to the Co-op refer a friend saga?

I noticed that the same decision in another case was published the week before the case I was involved with:

https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/decision/DRN-4203848.pdf

https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/decision/DRN-4217534.pdf