[jeff1]

11:30am Thursday 24th April: Bank charge test case Results

The courts have decided bank charges ARE covered by unfair contractual Term rules. This is a major victory for bank charges reclaiming and a huge step.

Reclaiming bank charges is the biggest consumer revolution since the poll tax riots. It’s estimated the banks have already paid out nearly £1 billion.

WANT TO RECLAIM BANK CHARGES? The regulator, the FSA has not yet lifted the hold on reclaiming. Yet it’s crucial to start a reclaim now, as you can only go back six years (five in Scotland), and delaying may mean you lose the ability to get the money for old charges back. To start your reclaim use the free template letters in the guide below.


FIND OUT THE LATEST NEWS ABOUT THE TEST CASE? For a full explanation of the latest state of play, what the ‘test case win’ means and how it impacts your claim read the Bank Charges News article.


ALREADY PUT IN A CLAIM? Full details on the latest state of play are in the Bank Charges News article.


WANT TO GET CREDIT CARD CHARGES BACK? This is easy to do, and unaffected by the test case; read the Credit Card Reclaiming article to find out what to do.


Warning. The situation is constantly changing.
When it does, the free weekly MoneySaving e-mail will tell you what to do.

Here is the link for you to check it out yourself, there is also a template letter for you to download.
www.moneysavingexpert.com/reclaim/bank-charges#step2

[jonah]

I did and got back £3,800 

[mci services]

did it about two years ago got about £2600 back
and didnt send any lettes just phoned financial ombusman and they did it all foc

[Wayne Thomas]

Got into debt 24 years ago, just the once, never again. Live life debt free, the only way to be.

[TVCS]

We got about a grand back last year.  It feels good to get your money back from the theiving bar stewards.  IMO

[alanwilson]

As a rough guide what percentage of your charges do you get back?

I've been through all our statements for the last 5 years (as suggested on money saving expert) and the charges total £4122

so how much can I expect to receive back.

Charges were things like account maintainance, charges for each dd even though the account has always been in credit.

[mci services]

alan it depends on what method you do it you can claim the full charges plus interest. but it means going through the process they offfer and eventually you accept and going through the letter templates and making sure its all worded correctly etc, it takes months. or you can let finicial ombusman do the initial work and then its left to you and the bank but if your not happy with bank offer the finianial ombusman will step in again and advise. so with the way i went i had no idea what i was owed but agreed with bank a settlement but you can do it  properly and get every thing back plus interest.
i know the template way is probably better finincialy but i just prefered to phone one number give a few details and eventually get an offer from bank after a few letters etc but i did nothing and got a nice pay out

[alanwilson]

thanks stu-mac

I think I'll ring the financial ombudsman and tell them what I have been charged then go the same way as yourself, I'm not interested in going the long route.

thanks matey

[mci services]

this is the number i phoned they took a few details and they did the rest
08450801800

[ronnie paton]

so can you get all charges back?? over draft intrest? business banking charges??ect

[mci services]

no its for when you get the £25 unothorised fees for being overdrawn by more than your limit etc or bounced checks or unpaid d/d that sort of thing, never did it with my business account it was on a personal account

[poleman]

so can you get all charges back?? over draft intrest? business banking charges??ect

CAN BE CLAIMED

Account misuse fee
Cheque return fee
Card misuse fee
Unarranged borrowing fee
Unauthorised overdraft fee
Unpaid DD fee
Unpaid cheque fee
Unpaid standing order fee
Exceeding Authorised Overdraft Limit
Exceeding Unauthorised Overdraft Limit
Direct Debit/Standing Order/Cheque returned fee
Irregular fee
Paid refferal fee


Credit Card/Store Cards/Catalogues

Late payment fee
Over limit fee

CANNOT BE CLAIMED

Cash Machine Withdrawal Fees (ATMs)
Account Service Charges
Service Fee / Annual Fee
Charges related to foreign currency transactions and conversions.
Monthly account fees on certain type of accounts (such as RBS Royalties)

[mci services]

so can you get all charges back?? over draft intrest? business banking charges??ect

CAN BE CLAIMED

Account misuse fee
Cheque return fee
Card misuse fee
Unarranged borrowing fee
Unauthorised overdraft fee
Unpaid DD fee
Unpaid cheque fee
Unpaid standing order fee
Exceeding Authorised Overdraft Limit
Exceeding Unauthorised Overdraft Limit
Direct Debit/Standing Order/Cheque returned fee
Irregular fee
Paid refferal fee


Credit Card/Store Cards/Catalogues

Late payment fee
Over limit fee

CANNOT BE CLAIMED

Cash Machine Withdrawal Fees (ATMs)
Account Service Charges
Service Fee / Annual Fee
Charges related to foreign currency transactions and conversions.
Monthly account fees on certain type of accounts (such as RBS Royalties)

cheers thats what i meant

[mr D]

Got into debt 24 years ago, just the once, never again. Live life debt free, the only way to be.

the only way. mummy told me ''if you cant afford it, wait till you can''.

[Wayne Thomas]

Got into debt 24 years ago, just the once, never again. Live life debt free, the only way to be.

the only way. mummy told me ''if you cant afford it, wait till you can''.

Why go out to work to line someone else's pocket?

[WCE]

 The fees that some of these banks charge is outrageous. A few years ago Sarah (My partner) had a problem with her wages from work being paid. Her employer at the time paid her by cheque and it bounced.  The bank did there usual thing of taking forever to process a cheque (another thing that annoys me about banks) and therefore she never got the returned cheque back until the day it would of cleared. As she was working that day she didn't find this out until she got home. The bank was closed and she didn't have access to online or telephone banking then so she had no way of contacting them. Anyway because of the cheque being returned she had £1.50 less than she needed in her account to pay a direct debit. So the bank refused to pay the the direct debit and then decided to charge her a £35.00 charge. They then said that because the £35.00 wasn't in her account they would charge her a £28.00 fee because she would have an unauthorised overdraft (This is all before she even knows about it) Then if that wasn't enough the company whose direct debit it was then tried to claim it again and the bank again charged Sarah £35.00 and  the £28.00. The fact they had done this only became clear later on when she asked why they had sent two letters about the charge and then was told she had in fact been charged twice for the same direct debit because the company  had applied twice. So for £1.50 the bank the bank had decided it was resonable to charge a grand total of £126.00! They even had the cheek to say that they only charged people for a maximum of 3 failed transactions a day (so upto £189.00). They wouldn't budge no matter what so Sarah reluctantly paid the  charges. It really got to me that they could charge so much over such a petty amount and there appeared to be nothing you could do about it. Then all this about reclaiming your bank charges came to light and I thought great! I got Sarah to change to my bank and we begun the process. The bank surprised me mind you because they didn't really put up much of a fight and it was pretty easy to get the cash back. Once I had refused their initial offer of 50% they folded and paid the lot. The downside is that as I expected they closed Sarahs account but that was no loss anyway.
  I did wonder if this court case would burst the bubble and the courts side with the bank but thank god some common sense was applied and the courts agreed that the charges are unfair.
  If you haven't already done so I would recommend starting the process asap.
When they have to give you your money back it is a great feeling!           

[Tim82]

got back 1100 from barclays and abbey. never thought about claiming them from credit cards. might look into it.

[clean]

Iv`e been to Barclays today and they say they are NOT paying any money back and freezing any claims already made because no decision has been made yet by the financial services authority,
has anyone had any luck with Barclays??

[Tim82]

has anyone had any luck with Barclays??

 Did you not see my last post, it's right above yours?    I got about 700 quid from barclays last year. They actually owed me 1400 but they said they could either give me the fulll amount and close my account or give me half and call it even. I chose the latter seeing as I needed the money at the time and didn't want the account closed(I was using it alot). You need to press them with a letter like the ones available at Martin the Money Saving Expert's website. Like any insurance claim etc. the first offer(if any)is usually crap. But if you keep trying you might get a better offer. Abbey gave me the full amount of 400 quid back right away and cancelled pending charges (they must be getting scared!  )