£700 in bank charges in a month - Help!

jessie15

Hi, Can someone please help as I am out of my depth and very stressed out! We are in a lot of debt which we are in the process of sorting out. Me and my husband have had a joint account which we have had for 21 yrs with Natwest which is £3000 overdrawn, we were advised to open another account with a different bank in case Natwest decided to take my husbands wages one month, so my husband opened an account with Barclays which his wages are now paid into. My husband spoke to Natwest advising them of the situation that we were in with debt and they suggested opening another account and transfering £1200 each month to pay direct debits, which he did (very stupidly). In January my husband received a call from Natwest advising him that they were taking our £1200 to pay towards our overdraft on the other account, they had 'words', hubby told them if they did this we would not be able to pay our direct debits and asked them to cancel them to which they agreed to do, although in the end Natwest did not take any money from this account but never informed us? Today we have had a statement from Natwest with nearly £700 of charges due to unpaid direct debits for one month!! My husband went into our local branch (spoke to Manager) who said tough basically, that it was up to him to cancel the direct debits not them, hubby pointed out to him his conversation with a Natwest employee and he said there was no record of this taking place! Hubby asked why we had not received any letters from Natwest letting us know of these charges mounting up and he said we must have had some and that someone must be intercepting our post! The only thing he could suggest is that we had an emergency loan to pay charges off at a cost of approx £250 per month, hubby pointed out that we am struggling to pay our essential bills how can we be expected to pay that - The manager could not offer any more help. Can they really get away with this? Please help as I can not sleep because of it.

jessie15

Please Help us!

magee737

Sorry to hear about your problems. First thing i would do is put this on the debt wannabe forum, they will be a much greater help than me. Personally i think you should ring up all your direct debits and make them aware of your problem possibly setting up with your new account and maybe agreeing new payments until your back on your feet. Id also ring up natwest and try ang agree a monthly payment with them, hopefully theyll freeze your intrest. You definitly need to communicate with everyone and make them aware of your problem.