Halifax One - compensation?

aliasojo · 19 July 2004 at 11:15AM

I'd really like input on this which is why I asked it as a separate query and not as an add on to my previous thread. Please someone advise if possible?

Condensed story so far:

MBNA made a transfer of £4000 and then £1900 to Halifax credit card by error - it should have gone to Halifax current account.

Not a problem say Halifax, we'll transfer it to your current account.

Had to phone many times over the last 10 days and been told something different each time I've called. Was told it would be transferred in total, then told no, it would be separately. Several times I've been told money will be in acc. on a particular day and it wasn't. Final straw this morning, checked online and a transfer has finally been made - for £950!!

Spitting feathers now, I'm about to write a letter of complaint. What (if anything) is reasonable for me to ask for compensation? I was understanding of the fact that mistakes can happen at the beginning but this is ridiculous. I don't see why they should be able to offer this level of customer service and get away with it. Although I haven't suffered any financial problems (apart from the cost of phone calls) because of this, it has affected our intentions for last week and meant we couldn't go through with plans made to go away and we had to let other people down.

I REALLY want to make an issue of this as I'm so angry, advice please???

Thanks (again). I do appreciate all the help you've been giving me!

Galstonian · 19 July 2004 at 11:34AM

"What (if anything) is reasonable for me to ask for compensation?"

Reasonably, you should not be out of pocket at all compared to if they had done things right. Any charges made should be reimbursed or made good by those at fault. You could claim for all phone calls and your time though how much you have spent and how much it costs would be up to you to "reasonably" estimate. I'm not too big on compensation for "pain and anguish" in these kind of circumstances but if a token sum for inconvenience is offered then I'd just accept. You may have a different view.
As for making an issue of it, by all means complain as much as you would like and of course stress that the inconvenience was fairly major and affected not just you.
One thing to always try and keep in focus if phoning that you are dealing with people who are probably not directly responsible for the problem and probably don't have direct control over te solution - they can be very stressed too and getting angry doesn't result in the outcome anyone wants. Much better a cool calm and reasoned written approach. If that dosn't work then escalate your complaint.

Good luck.

aliasojo · 19 July 2004 at 12:43PM

Guess what? I'm a money launderer now !!!

I'd cry if it wasn't so laughable. Just off the phone to yet another csa who tells me that because our cc account was in credit by so much (£5900) it would appear that the money laudering laws have come into force and the only money they could transfer was the £950 - the rest had to go back to MBNA.

Q. Why did they even transfer £950 then?
A. Don't know.

Couldn't transfer me to supervisor/manager, all calls have to be logged then customers are called back. Refused to be molified and csa eventually spoke to someone in finance. Turns out the money didn't go back to MBNA after all, what they were looking at was a transfer I had done online to EGG! Eventually after going through story for the umpteenth time Finance agreed to transfer money to current account today but I got a lecture about not having my account in this position again as an account in credit by largish amounts will be subject to money laundering laws! Furious now as situation wasn't even of our making. (So be careful all of you who may end up with an account in credit because of SBTing.)

I am ALWAYS calm and polite when dealing with people (furious inside) and I make a point of making it clear to whoever I am dealing with that I don't hold them personally responsible but that I'm annoyed with the situation itself. I have to say, everyone I have spoken to has been really nice (just given me useless info).

Thanks for reply Gal. I've got the address for complaints from the last csa so I'm off to write now detailing complaint and asking to be reimbursed for phone calls and for inconvenience.

Galstonian · 19 July 2004 at 1:16PM

I am not aware of any money laundering laws that you are breaking. You are merely displaying the characteristics of a money launderer which the bank are legally responsible for trying to prevent. It has been a warning often repeated on this site when doing exactly what you are doing but I'd be interested to hear 1) if it really is being flagged as such and 2) what happens if it is.

I think once you have it all sorted this your complaint would be best dealt with in writing. All too often promises made on the phone don't end up being followed through. Just try to get a CS rep to confirm something by email and you can hear them furiously kicking against this in most cases. Written complaints have procedures and have to be dealt with in most organisations. Phone calls seem to be easy to forget.

bpyoung · 19 July 2004 at 3:30PM

See my previous thread titled "Halifax Incompetence". After I spoke to a supervisor he said he'd credit my card by £15 because of their !!!!!!-ups. Although I don't recall seeing it actually credited to my account yet...

Edit: here's the link: http://forum.moneysavingexpert.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=Questions;action=display;num=1089151435

aliasojo · 19 July 2004 at 4:22PM

You are merely displaying the characteristics of a money launderer ........

Not sure how to take that....

I know what you mean though. What's infuriating is that we've ended up in this position through MBNA's error in the first place, then through the misinformation given by Halifax. It's not as if we were deliberately trying to manipulate the system ourselves.

I've just checked bank account again and money has appeared. It's amazing how quickly they can do things when they want! However I too can move quickly and it's all now been transferred out again. ;D

Letter of complaint is to be posted this afternoon, so I'll await their reply with interest.

bpyoung: I read your post, thanks. I hope you find you have actually got the £15!

Personally I would expect at least this figure for reimbursement for phone costs alone, along with a reasonable amount for the inconvenience.

When I hear anything I'll post an update in case the info is of any use to anyone else, perhaps in a similar situation.

aliasojo · 1 August 2004 at 3:32PM

Quick update:

Received letter from Halifax, agreeing with every point I made and apologising profusely. They have credited our cc account with £20 as a goodwill gesture in respect of costs and inconvenience. They've taken the matter up with the call centre manager to try to address the training issues so that all advisors will at least be singing from the same hymn sheet.

I'm happy with their reply, but not so happy with the £20. Perhaps I'm being unreasonable but I expected a slightly larger sum. Halifax have been known to credit accounts with this type of amount just because of phone calls made, so I feel that by crediting us with the same, they haven't fully taken into account the hassle that was involved.

Milarky · 1 August 2004 at 6:07PM

Received letter from Halifax, agreeing with every point I made and apologising profusely. They have credited our cc account with £20 as a goodwill gesture in respect of costs and inconvenience.

I'm happy with their reply, but not so happy with the £20.

I was a little disappointed when Halifax charged me interest on my 'upgrade' to a 'One' card for the first 10 days or so of the opening statement period, and only refunded half of this when I queried what they had done. The balance for these days had been at 0% on the outgoing 9 months card deal - and was then paid back before that 9 months had expired and before I even requested an upgrade! So be charged interest like this was 'retroactive'. [To avoid this, you should request an upgrade only after receiving a statement showing your balance repaid.]

Anyway, they seem to be stingy with 'goodwill' at the moment, don't they? I would refer you to your 'One' card T&C 1.8 "£25 each time you do not make a minimum payment by the payment date", "25 if your account is over your credit limit on a statement date","£25 each time a direct debit, cheque or other item is not paid, including a cheque which you write"

It's obviously from these charges that on a 'good day' (when all three things happen at the same time) that Halifax could charge you £75.

So it might be worth going back to them and stressing the 'compound nature' of the difficulites this problem caused you?

However, have you established whose 'fault' it was that the original transfer went to a Halifax credit card? [Just curious?]

aliasojo · 1 August 2004 at 11:17PM

Thanks Milarky. I am actually intending to write back with regard to the £20 as I really don't feel they have placed enough importance on the inconvenience they caused.

Just as a by the by, I have read of a couple of instances in today's papers of people who were given £50 goodwill payments by companies as a result of only a small error. I would have though this to be a more reasonable sum and will be pointing this out to the Halifax. Interesting point about the T and C's.

The original mistake was made by MBNA, they admitted this and apologised, the wrong account number was used. I was happy to accept the apology as I'm well aware mistakes can happen.......it's just a shame the Halifax made the situation a whole lot worse.

Halifax One - compensation?

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