Talk

Flip

AIBU?

to imagine that paying a cheque into our account should not send us overdrawn?

21 replies

mrsrawlinson · 12/08/2009 16:58

DH is self employed and last weekend we paid a cheque into our business bank account. I'll refrain from naming the bank in question but let's just say the name rhymes with 'shabby'. It was for something DH had been working on for over a year so it was for quite a considerable amount.

On Friday, we were on our way to a friend's wedding and stopped for some breakfast en route and our card was declined. DH rang the bank to find out what was going on as there should have been cleared funds available. When he asked for a balance, he was told we were £15,000-odd overdrawn!

When DH regained his powers of speech, he was told that because the cheque we'd paid in was quite large they suspected it might be fraudulent so it had been referred to their fraud department for verifcation. Fair enough, you might think. Except what they'd done is DEDUCT the amount of the cheque in question from our account (which doesn't even have an overdraft facility!) while it was in abeyance. They'd done this without even telling us, let alone asking our permission.

So, about 2 hours of heated telephone calls ensued trying to sort it out, during which we were told that we'd have to get a letter from our client to say that the cheque was legitimate and take it into the branch in person. This may have been do-able if we were at home, only we were on our way to a wedding then on holiday from there - all without any money available to us. I told them that this wouldn't be possible until Tuesday (DH was driving by this point so I got to vent my spleen for a bit!) as we were away and told them that they'd have to authorise the overdraft they'd put us into and add a bit on so that we could access some funds over the weekend while we were away. "I'll send a form to your house," came the reply.

I got a bit cross then. I told the complete numpty that I would not leave the telephone line until he'd sorted it out, and eventually he came back and said "OK MrsRawlinson, that's all sorted and your account's back to where it was before the deduction." Thinking it was done and dusted we went to the wedding, and on the way to the reception stopped at a cash machine. No prizes for guessing what we were greeted with.... Cue another hour of heated phone conversation (this time in a hotel lobby as we'd no phone signal) where we were repeatedly told "Nothing we can do"; "It's just the system"; "It's after five now, you'll have to wait until Monday".

Eventually DH managed to speak to someone who managed to link in one of our other accounts to our card so we could at least access some funds over the weekend and the VAT man could be paid!

Fortunately now they seem to have cleared the cheque so it's all sorted, but I'm still incandescant at being treated like that just because we paid a cheque in! Needless to say we've written to them and everyone else who'll listen, including the ombudsman, the FSA and the Bank of England for good measure.

Has anyone else ever experienced anything similar? Surely they're not allowed to do that, are they?

Gosh, that was a long rant. Sorry about that.

OP posts:

Report

Lilybunny · 12/08/2009 17:18

What an awful time for you and you'd done nothing to deserve it! Sadly it would seem that banks can do what they please. I'm glad to hear that you have made a complaint and I do hope that you get some satisfaction (and compensation). I would certainly be changing my bank once it is all sorted. Good luck.