Egg £16 overlimit fee

TrickyDicky

It appears to be my month for charges. first I get £25 from A&L for being £13 over my OD limit for a day while cheques cleared (which they refunded a week after I complained) and now EGG have added £16 on my statment for going £19.17 over my limit, for only 3 days. Im surpried they let the payments go through in the first place!

The guy on the phone said he couldnt do anything other than put a complaint in, unlike A&L whos friendly man on the phone said he could ask for it to be reviewed. So how I do move with this. I know the OFT said £12 was the max they should charge, so do I keep ringing them every day till I get a response? or do I get militant and fire the letters off?

johnllew

Pay up, get over it & be more careful in future.

Milarky

Egg do have a £16 fee - which appears to be allowed even though the OFT did raise guidelines for charges to be no more than £12. I think Egg are relying on some aspect of the wording which allows for 'exceptions' and they have (successfully so far) made themselves the exception.

In other words, as johnllew suggests, this fee can't be challenged.

jamalfatty

Milarky wrote: »

Egg do have a £16 fee - which appears to be allowed even though the OFT did raise guidelines for charges to be no more than £12. I think Egg are relying on some aspect of the wording which allows for 'exceptions' and they have (successfully so far) made themselves the exception.

In other words, as johnllew suggests, this fee can't be challenged.

I believe in Egg's case, the OFT allowed them to charge £16 on the basis that as they insist on having a direct debit set up from the outset, and have slightly more stringent lending criteria than other banks they received fewer people defaulting than other credit card companies and thus their costs were higher per default

Mickey_Monk

jamalfatty wrote: »

I believe in Egg's case, the OFT allowed them to charge £16

The OFT have not "allowed" anybody to charge £16 or any other amount.

They have never stated whether any charge is fair or unfair.
The OFT categorically said the decision whether a charge is unfair is for a court to decide.

What they have said is that, unless a company can demonstrate exceptional business factors, they will presume any charge over £12 is unfair and will challenge the charge.

jamalfatty

Mickey_Monk wrote: »

The OFT have not "allowed" anybody to charge £16 or any other amount.

They have never stated whether any charge is fair or unfair.
The OFT categorically said the decision whether a charge is unfair is for a court to decide.

What they have said is that, unless a company can demonstrate exceptional business factors, they will presume any charge over £12 is unfair and will challenge the charge.

The fact they are not currently going to challenge any fee's £12/£16 and under means they are currently "allowing" these amounts.

Regardless of the semantics anyway and getting back to original question, OP asked if Egg could get away with charging £16, which they can.

DifferentFromTheNorm

Back on topic:

To the OP, the person you spoke to first is required to say no, if they say yes they'll be going against company guidelines so would get a 'telling off' if found out.

Call them back, be polite but persistent. If it's the first time it's happened point that out to them (their system will show how many times you've been over limit though). They will decline again but ask them to check with their supervisor/team leader. Before they go explain that if they're supervisor/team leader declines then you'd like to speak to them to discuss it further.

If, in the unlikely event you get passed to the team leader and they still decline, then ask for it to be passed on to the Customer Relations Office. You could even state you're willing to go to the Financial Ombudsman if you like and ask them to state then when they refer the complaint.

I doubt it will go that far. If it does then the Customer Relations Office have more important things to deal with than someone with just one £16 charge (especially if it's the first time).

If you don't want to call their 0845 number then just call the number given for international calls, it gets you through to the same place. It's given on the 'Contact Us' page online or on the back of your card.