not notified of bank charges....

Comedy

This is a little off-topic for this forum but I couldn't see a better place to post it. I apolgise if there is one.

I moved the the US a couple of years ago and have a bank account with the Halifax in the UK that I use to pay a few bills I still have going out. The amount that goes out of the account is the same each month, as-is the amount I put in (the amount I put in being slightly higher).

Back in January Halifax charged me for a returned direct debit, I didn't receive any notification of this but the charge then took me overdrawn... another charge. I'm sure we all know how annoying this cycle is.

Anyway, it gets to april and i find out about this whole situation because one of the recipients of these payments calls me to tell me they're not getting paid anymore. I check my bank and realise that halifax are now taking more money than I'm putting in each month... I instantly cancelled all my direct debits and continue to pay money into the account. It's now a month later and the charges again took me overdrawn but it looks like for the last time.


I called Halifax about this and they told me that as of some date their policy on charge notification changed so they are not required to notify me before charges 'because we found a lot of the time the notifications weren't getting out in time' <<--- their words, not mine. I have a recorded conversation between me and the Halifax rep telling me of this policy.


So... I'm wondering if they are actually obliged to notify me of charges?

If they are then I plan to take this one to the courts outside of the whole 'overcharging' issue that's going on.



Thanks
Dave

MarkyMarkD

AFAIK most banks pre-notify you of interest and monthly type charges, but simply debit charges for rejected or paid items when the transaction is posted.

I don't believe there is any requirement for pre-notification.

It's a bit telling that you didn't notice that you had gone overdrawn until 3 months after the event, and then only because a recipient notified you. Perhaps reading your bank statements online a bit more frequently would help?

Comedy

MarkyMarkD wrote: »

It's a bit telling that you didn't notice that you had gone overdrawn until 3 months after the event, and then only because a recipient notified you. Perhaps reading your bank statements online a bit more frequently would help?

That is true but my bank has been in this exact situation for the past 3 years without problem so after time you get used to the fact things are working.

Anyway, I managed to speak to someone at Halifax again today who has reversed out all the charges singe the last time I spoke to them (end of april) and has cancelled any future ones. This time they tell me their policy *is* to notify before posting charges and that I would have seen these notifications in my online banking.. as I have paper-free statements. Both of us went through my online notifications and are in agreement that there was no forewarning done for any of the charges. Looks like a good result on my part, they're going to look into why I didn't receive anything and if it's on their end they'll refund the remaining charges by tuesday.

We'll see....