claim back bank charges...

info here - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6170209.stm

http://www.governmentauctionsuk.co.uk/bank-charges.php

http://www.penaltycharges.co.uk/banks.php

but with me being a lazy so and so - I've enlisted the services of -

http://www.bankcomplaints.co.uk/?gclid=CNr68tv2oIkCFQ1MZwodQRZ4Qg

they do operate on a no win no fee policy and take a 25% chunk of any winnings...but hey, what the hell...



anyone else trying it..?

 

Since I've never incurred a penalty charge, I'll have to sit this one out.

 

nice one - I'm sure that I have - but can't remember...however, they'll check for me...

 

All of the people I know who have tried this, have written to the bank on their own behalf and have got the bulk of the fees refunded , including one of my financialy chaotic children :student:. I would suggest that you write on your own behalf in the first instance citing the BBC or Guardian articles and including a veiled threat to pursue the matter through the small claims court if necessary. Using these agencies will give you no better guarantee of payment and if they do succeed they will get a slice of your money.

Best of luck

Alby

 

From
www.moneysavingexpert.com


Bank Charge Reclaiming. Spread the word and stop the vultures!
This weekend in London's West End, many cashpoints were flyered with leaflets telling people about bank charge reclaiming. Yet it wasn't a consumer group, instead it was a claim handling company, which, alongside some avaricious lawyers, is starting to offer "no win - no fee" services. Yet most people should be doing this through the small claims system, which doesn't need representation, thus keeping all their winning cash. Please spread the word. Don't pay to reclaim. Read Bank Charges: Reclaim Your Cash which includes all the template letters to get it done

 

Whilst I have no love lost for the financial services industry, I do believe that this whole thing is a reflection on society's current view on debt. Most people I went to university with regarded a credit card as something to be acquired, maxed out and minimums paid. Overdraft was "free money". It is the attitude that debt is normal that is wrong.

 

looking at the replies to this post (and on other forums I've posted this) - there does seem to be 2 camps regarding this...one (like myself) - who're a bit miffed at being over charged and are trying to reclaim some back...and others (on their high horse? *grin*) who're trying to get to grips with being in debt in the first place...as we all know - if it was only that simple...!

 

what about the third camp....

have paid fees at times to banks, interest rate charges etc...

but see this as something that's been accepted for many years, and see no reason why they should threaten their bank (and a lifetime of good relationship) with a law suit just to make a few quid?

claiming back bank charges is just the latest ''scam'' in my view.

 

Just as a point of information, UK people are pretty unusual in historically expecting and getting free banking services. There is an economics argument that since banks make their money somehow, whether concealed or open, so it is better that bank charges are explicit and charged, so that they are more easily exposed to competition and market forces, rather than hidden away somewhere.

 

Of course there are situations that can arise where something happens that is not the fault of the person being penalised... for example their pay is late and consequently a DD gets bounced and penalties charged for that.

But an awful lot of the complaining I hear about these things is from people my own age who have an income, have a new car on finance, credit cards maxed out, rent to pay, mobile phone, satellite TV and put away £50 in drinks the previous night.

I've paid £24 in bank charges over the years... once for a cashier's cheque, once for an IBAN transfer. I think that the price charged is a total rip-off and that the charges should reflect true cost. But for people to feel hard done by when penalised because they didn't keep their finances in order seems a bit unjustified.

The other thing to remember is that this is the cost of free banking. If you want a bank account in the USA that offers similar facilities to a UK free account then you'd expect to pay about $10 per month for it. This is true in most of the world; the level of service received on free current accounts in the uk is unusually high.

Edit: steveC beat me to that last point

 

You're quite right. I pay 6 euros a month for my French current account.

 

Isaac, with due respect, that's bullshit. This is about banks massively massively over penalising people IN ADDITION to charging them much higher interest for the OD excess.

I have tried hard to ensure we do not incur such charges yet we get hit far too often. You have already stated you've never incurred one so really are you in the best position to comment?

 

I said that the charges should reflect true cost. The point is that the attitude displayed by many (and you may well not be one of them) is that the banks shouldn't charge at all for these things which cause them a cost. And the bank is, at the end of the day, a business and they need to make a profit on the services they provide.

Why not? I don't believe myself to be particularly atypical as a person. If it's possible for me to avoid such charges then I can't be the only one?

Like I said, it is not always the one who gets penalised who caused it to happen. I think the financial services industry deliberately pushes DD because with several unknown amounts going out of your account each month can cause this, at which point they profit on the penalty charges... I only pay my mobile phone and my mortgage that way because there isn't an offered alternative. Everything else I keep control of.

 

I am in the process of claiming back over £2000 in bank charges at the moment. It is easy to say it it is my fault they were incurred, but it is just as easy to find yourself in a downward spiral of charges from the bank etc. Despite the MASSIVE profits that the banks make, and they are MASSIVE, you will get no sympsthy from them, in fact, they are sitting there just waiting for this to happen...

My own personal cicumstances changed, and before I could alter my situation to take this into account, the charges appeared, creating a financial vacuum into which all of my salary fell, and increasing each time I incurred the charges. The bank were extremely unsympathetic, and it was long before this downward spiral of debt became all enveloping. It is not a nice feeling.

Banks are the carrion feeders of the financial world, wiating for the financially weak or unstable to fuel their never ending greed for profit. They need to be taught a lesson, it is legalised loan sharking, and people are losing their houses, jobs, families and dignity to this dispicable practice.

Stand up, accept your situation, it may not be of your doing, and is nothing to be ashamed of. The courts are on YOUR side, not once have Barclays challenged an individual at court level who is trying to get back wgat they are owed. This is because Barclays know they have been unlawful, and unless they settle out of court as they do, they will find themselves engulfed by a tsunami of claims to get back what they took from honest (mostly) hardworking people, as a legal precident will have been set.

DO IT...

Anyone want to borrow this soap box?.....

 

This has been rattling on for a while now and I thinks it's great - if you read the moneysavingexpert guide on this you find that the ultimate action against the bank if they don't repay the charges, is to send bailiffs to the bank on your behalf - how I'd love to see that .

I also think the banks deserve no sympathy either, their charges are not proportional to the circumstances in which they apply them. The whole 'free banking' or 'not' thing is a load of pap IMO, the big high street banks have assets in the £billions, they make colossal profits from investments a wide variety of sources, bank charges are not their main income. They lend money to people who can't afford it and charge obscene interest rates, they positively encourage debt, they bombard you with offers of credit cards with ludicrously high limits; basically they're pretty unscrupulous.

I haven't had any charges on my account for about 10 years and that's too far back for me to be concerned about, but I still support anyone and everyone who claims their back.

 

You yourself commented:

From my perspective if I was single with no children, financially I would quite literally be laughing. As it is, my wife puts the needs of the family above balancing the credits and debits. She doesn't waste money and she doesn't buy much at all for me or her, but she uses the debit card and if I don't keep an eye on the accounts (we have four current accounts to try and keep things segregated) sometimes a debit payment will take us over our limit.

There used to be a £30 buffer and a £25 charge. There's now a £5 buffer and a £30 charge. To my mind this is profiteering. Look at the declared profits of the UK banks. They don't struggle to make money.

 

The basic and core point is the charges they levy have been deemed unacceptably high by the ombudsman. It's really that simple. The ombudsman considers the charge is not a fair sum.

It can't work that the banks pay for free banking by excessively charging for peripheral "services".

As you all probably know - free banking is largely funded by the curious and unexplained "clearance" period of cheques and BACS payments. Basically the money is put on the markets for 24hours. This, according to a Barclays dude on Moneybox, is how free banking is paid for.

 

And yet you are prepared to spend on luxuries:

I don't disagree with this. In fact, I've already said this twice so far in this thread. But the point is also that expecting no charge at all is also unreasonable.

These things still occur with paid-for accounts. They are an additional profit mechanism.

Indeed not. But we don't place limits on how much profit any company, be it a bank or otherwise, may make. They are obliged to achieve the best results for their shareholders. If ford could sell a focus for £30000 they would.

It comes down to what people are prepared to pay... we pay through the nose for petrol for example because the government knows we will. They could double the cost of petrol and yet driving would remain the best way for me to get to work. The banks have been increasing these charges because they knew they could... only just now is the issue reaching tipping point where they realise that they've gone too far. In the meantime, they have secured good results for their shareholders.

 

I personally have not suggested it should be free and I don't expect it to be free. The Ombudsman recommend a level of £7 I think. The banks have unofficially agreed a higher sum (c. £12) which may also be contested. I'd be happy to get back c. £23 per charge and not a penny more.

 

Then we agree.