Did you know that bank charges of more than £12.00 have been ruled as unfair by the OFT and you can claim your money back? And your claim can cover the last 6 years?

[tigermoth]

I've cut and pasted the article that appeared in Telegraph money section:

Get your money back from the bank

The Office of Fair Trading's ruling that bank penalty charges of more than £12 are unfair could spark a flood of complaints from customers seeking compensation for unjustified charges over several years.

Earlier this month the OFT ruled that penalty charges for late payments on credit cards, unauthorised overdrafts, unpaid direct debits and standing orders and missed payment fees on store cards and mortgages were deemed unfair if they exceeded £12.

Last weekend, this paper revealed that this could lead to redress for bank customers who have been erroneously charged for the past six years.

The OFT's initiative strengthens the case of anyone who has seen penalty charges automatically deducted from their accounts after falling foul of bank and building society small print. As with any legal proceedings, there is not a 100 per cent guarantee that you will win, but lawyers and consumer groups reckon the OFT's position means judges will be far more likely to accept arguments that penalties of more than £12 amount to unfair contract terms that cannot be enforced.

The process for reclaiming the unfair charges from your bank is straightforward.

First your bank is obliged to supply you on demand with a list of all charges you have paid in the past six years under the Data Protection Act. You then need to write demanding the bank repays the unfair charges. If that is not successful, you can take the matter further by either going to the small claims court of the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS).

More details on how to claim and pro forma letters are available on the website of Which?, the consumer group.

"Claiming back these unfair charges from the banks is a relatively straightforward process," says Emma Bandey, a personal finance campaigner at Which? "These charges are nothing but an easy money-spinner for the banks."

I am thinking of doing this. What a windfall if I am successful!

But I am worried about something. If I push for this, and my bank give me my money back, is there a risk that the bank might start to get difficult with me? I don't want them to mysteriously refuse to send me a new cheque book, refuse to extend my overdraft limit or refuse a loan. Do you think there is a risk that banks might start doing this to customers who claim their charges back?

I sent my first letter to the Abbey back in April. I got a reply saying they were looking into it then i got a letter a month later asking for £10.00. Today I have received another letter saying they have arranged for duplicate statements to be sent out to me, anything that is not held on their system that has gone to archive there is a £10.00 fee for multiple statements - could I write to them to let them know what they want me to do. It sounds like they are continuously coming up with delaying tactics. Its very frustrating.

If you sign up to the Bank Action Group forum here you can access their library of letters to adapt & send to your bank - includes deadlines to discourage them from delaying tactics!

V useful - we've just sent off our first request for repayment to Lloyds TSB. £795 charges spread over 2 accounts in 4 years!

I had letter in response to my request to see all the charges requesting £10 fee to do so. I had to confirm in writing that they could have fee and deduct from account and I did so three weeks ago. They still havent deducted and i notice on thier letter that they have 40 days from receipt of fee to provide info.

Crafty eh!!They are delaying on deducting fee so I have sent stroppy email and rang them DEMANDING that they deduct fee TODAY!!

Watch for this!!

I've had a year's worth of duplicate statements from Abbey - posted separately - what a waste of postage!

But the stuff they said is held on microfiche is yet to appear.

chocolatepeanut, it makes it much harder for them to do this if you just send a cheque for the £10 with your request, then the 40 days start at the day you send the cheque
If you have a chequebook and are doing this would definitely advise doing it this way otherwise they will just delay as long as they possibly can.

hunker and everyone, it took some weeks to get my duplicate statements - and six or seven phone calls. I noticed that every time I phoned, it seemed to move things along and I got some sort of letter or statement a few days after.

I am still waiting to hear the response to my first letter requesting a refund. The bank have had it for well over 2 weeks (the response deadline stated in the letter). The bank's customer services said they were having a lot of requests and were behind with things.

I wonder if the delay in getting out statements is also a reflection of this - not just a delay tactic?

Yes, I think that there are an awful lot of people claiming now, hence the delays.

can anyone advise me what to do next

Just received a letter from NATWEST this morning which contains this paragraph

We believe that our charges are fair, reasonable and transparent. We consider that the amounts debited to your account have been applied strictly in accordance with your agreement with us and our published tarriff, which we are satisfied complies with all applicable laws and regulations. We are also committed to ensuring the transparency of the information that we give to our customers about the operation of our products. Charges that have been applied to your account must stand.

Have I got a leg to stand on ? over the last 4 years, nearly £4,500 charghes have been applied, I am not disputing being charged, just the amount.

Anyone, please ?

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Did your letter give the contact details for the financial ombudsman? You could try phoning them for advice - I bet you are not the only person in this situation.

From reading customer case histories from website futher down this thread, it seems to me that requests for refunds that go into thousands may be met with an initial refusal or an offer of a compromise amount, in exchange for the customer dropping a request for a full refund.

If you scroll down, hopefully you will see the link - I think there are several websites like that one. In your position, I would definitely phone the financial ombudsman for advice and look on some other websites - they have topics dedicated to each bank so you may see what other Nat West customers are getting. And I probably wouldnt give up - but that's only my personal opinion - I am no expert.

Has anyone lese been charged for statements, we are looking at 200 quid which we simply cannot afford.

mkm - it should only be £10 - isn't there a ruleing on that as well if they try to charge you more than £10. althou girls, i've realised (as i'm sure u have) with the lloyds on line banking you can search the statements online and find the amounts that way - can be timely but if it saves u a few quid. I know it works with lloyds not sure on any other banks thou.

Golds, I got the same reply from RBS. Sent another letter saying I'd take them to court to which they replied they stand by their previous letter.
I've now done a court claim online with moneyclaim online and they have until Friday to file a defence. HTH.
Mkm, as Munz says its legally a £10 max charge for a request for information

Good luck, Golds - this might be of interest to you. Someone at work showed me an article in the Daily Mail money section. It reported that two people who had both put in claims for refunds from their banks had got full refunds at or near the last hurdle. One of the people did as you have done - filed a court claim online and on the 13th day (ie the day before the case went to court) the bank contacted them with news they were refunding the full amound 'as a good will gesture' ie accepting no liability.

The article said that people should not be intimidated by banks refusing them - it is standard practice to intimidate people. Also, people should also not agree to a compromise amount.

I did read on another financial website (though don't know if it true) that so far, no bank has taken a customer to the small claims court over demands for refunds, so they all must back down in the end

HTH and do keep us posted if you can!

Good luck topbanana - I meant you as well as Golds!

thanks for your advice guys

Just had a quick chat with a bloke at the end of the phone for Woolwich openplan. He too is waiting for his charge refund from his own personal bank and was getting a bit impatient with them. He said the Woolwich have been a bit swamped with refund letters, but lots of banks are deliberately dragging their heels, waiting to see what happens with Alliance and Leicester closing accounts and also waiting to see what the courts rule.

I wrote my letter on 5th June and have heard nothing!

That gives them a week to comply with the 40 day thing...

Just wanted to say thanks for this tigermoth - I have done 4 accounts (2 Nat West, 1 First Driect and 1 Abbey) and so far have got £58 back from one Nat West account, which was the whole lot I asked for, and I accepted £65 back from First Direct (1/2 of what I asked for) as they have been a good bank and have let me have an overdraft facility even when I haven't been earning due to having too many small children. Abbey and the other Nat West account have told me to b*gger off, so I will be writing that second letter to them and we'll see what happens. Quite pleased so far though - £123 for an hour or so's work!

well i have just finally got round to asking barclays for the last 6 yrs of charges, the lady on the phone was really nice and said they will only charge me £5 so i will wait and see now.

Wow 1st letter going out to HSBC in the morning cause they must owe me loads been with them since I left school and through two bouts of matty leave they have royally screwed me. Will persue them for money back then move my account else where. They have just charged me £75 for going overdrawn and bouncing a cheque which wouldn't of happened if they hadn't charged me £30 last month for the sake of a couple of quid for 2 days.

We wrote to Barclays a while ago using the first letter template and got a printout through the post of all statements. We worked out they owe dp around £750 - altohugh they have changed their fees to £15 from £30.

We sent the second letter asking for the money back and got a reply saying the letter has been forwarded to head office complaints dept and we will get a reply no later than 16th July..... fingers crossed!!!!

Have just spoken on the phone to Customer Relations department. They say they've not received my letter

The woman I spoke to has requested copy statements for the last 6 years and is having them sent out. I should have them within a fortnight.

Cost me £5.

Managed to look at my statements on line and charges range from £10 which isn't too bad to the latest set which was £75. Have worked out the total amount of charges to be £1053 so am sending letter number two off in the morning.