Problem Please Help!? Advice required

Gaggsy14

On the 8th of April i paid off the remaining balance of my Mint Credit Card.

On the 16th of April after confirming that the Account had a ZERO balance i cancelled the Card, and recieved a cancellation letter a few days later stating that the account was closed and everything was in order.

On the 21st of April i noticed that Mint had accessed my Bank Account to withdraw their Minimum Payment (£8) despite confirmation previously that the balance was indeed ZERO.

I then spoke to a callcentre worker who confirmed that i should have cancelled my Direct Debit. I re-read the letter and in no part of the letter did it state that a direct debit should be cancelled, neither had the numerous MINT staff i had spoken to mentioned the cancellation of the direct debit.

I asked to speak to a supervisor, the supervisor explained that he would be happy to re-imburse me but a cheque was to be sent within `3 Weeks`!! The Supervisor the ever helpful Phil said that MINT didnt use 1st class post. I told him that 5 days after my cancellation conversation i had received a letter confirming the cancellation.

I then had a further phone call from MINT saying that a % of the £8 would be taken from the refund, as interest had accrued on the account between the date of my last statement (26th March) to the date i paid the balance off on the 3rd. He stated that had the £8 not been debited then my account would of had a negative balance and a final bill would have been sent. Another thing that all advisors failed to mention to me when closing my account.
Is this legal to not inform customers or is it against FSA regulations etc, any help would be much appreciated

CLAPTON

Its poor customer service of course but in accordance with the T&Cs you agreed to.

Worth remembering for next time
- you need to cancel a DD
- DD are initiated several days before they are debited from your account
- interest accrues daily but is only added monthly so a zero balance may show on the screen because the interest has not yet been added.
- to completely clear a CC you need to have zero showing on 2 consecutive statements

Gaggsy14

`Poor Service` or Against FSA guidelines on treating customers fairly??

CannyJock

Yup, what Clapton said.

There's a minimum 10 days notice from informing someone of a DD amount and it coming out of their account under the DD Code. Sounds like they initiated the DD for the minimum amount before your payment had cleared with them?

The residual interest that would have been on your "next statement" is correct, only way to avoid this is to over-pay the account putting it in a positive balance and then getting a refund.

It's annoying but they're just following their rules, not something the FSA would entertain.

And because you've already cancelled with them, you've not got a lot of negotiating ammo to get them to refund the full £8.

What you could do is get other cards from the RBS stable and stooze it to get a lot more than £ 8 back from them

CLAPTON

Gaggsy14 wrote: »

`Poor Service` or Against FSA guidelines on treating customers fairly??

I dont really think you have been treated unfairly as these are standard T&Cs and as I see it you have been treated in accordance with them.

Poor service, yes, as they should have told you about residual interest, DD delays etc... but I suspected that the call centre staff probably don't understand the T&Cs any better than you do.

Gaggsy14

Thanks for the Advice.................Indian call centres????? Class!