Is your bank quoting the Lloyds victory to put you off claiming? - Contact the BBC

[BankFodder]

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk...t.php?f=6&a=92

[GaryH]

It seems that Abbey ARE doing this - I've seen two letters from their solicitor today containing this -

We also refer you to the recent judgment in Berwick & Haughton -v- Lloyds TSB wherein it was found that “there was no ground in law for recovering from the bank the amount of any charges he has paid to it.”

The fundamental issue in Berwick v Lloyds concerned whether or not the charges were imposed as a result of a breach of contract.

The judge decided that the claimant did not demonstrate a breach of contract, so found in favour of the bank's "service charge, not default" defence.

Abbey admit that their charges are default charges arising from breaches of contract - they defend on the basis that they are a pre-estimate of the loss suffered by Abbey as a result of your breach.

Berwick v Lloyds is therefore completely and utterly irrelevant!

....and the reference to it in the letters they have started to send out should be disregarded as intimidatory and yet another shameless trick in their abusive litigation strategy.

Don't let them bully you into accepting a lower amount, and write back rejecting their reference to the Lloyds judgement and request its withdrawn. Also quote the claim's in which their defence has been thrown out by judges as an abuse of process.

Dear Ms ******,

Thank you for your letter dated [date].

Unfortunately I am not willing to reconsider my position in respect of the amount at which these matters will be settled, until such time as Abbey discoses its true loss incurred as a result of each of my contractual breaches.

Furthermore, I am wholly disappointed that you have chosen to erroneously cite the case of Berwick -v- Lloyds as relevant in respect of my own claim against your client.

As you are surely very well aware, the issues upon which the recent judgement was made in favour of Lloyds TSB fundamentally differ from those of my own claim. The District Judge at Birmingham County Court found that in the particular case, a breach of contract was not demonstrated by the claimant, and therefore upheld Lloyds defence that the charges were fee's for a service, as opposed to default charges. This small claims track judgement is not binding on any other court, and is in fact subject to an appeal.

Abbey Plc does not attempt to "cloak" its charges in the same manner - it readily admits that they arise from breaches of contract, and you do in fact refer to them as 'defaults' in the very correspondance to which this letter is in reply.

Therefore, I quite reasonably consider your letter to be part of Abbey's wider strategy of attempting to intimidate claimants and dissaude them from pursuing legitimate complaints.

May I also refer you to claim numbers 7DC42005 and 7NB00229, where your defence was found by the respective district judges to be an abuse of court process and resultingly struck out.

Accordingly, I respectfully request that you reply to me by [date] retracting your reference to the case of Berwick -v- Lloyds TSB, and furthermore apologising for this transgression.

I look forward to your prompt response.

Yours Sincerely,


Copy to;

***** County Court

[adamc6671]

Once again, Gary, totally brilliant. Hugely appreciate the time and effort you put in to help us.

Adam.

[Robdblynd]

Got the same thing in an email yesterday when they offered 60% as full and final.

Needless to say they were told to revise their figures upwards before I'd consider it and that the Lloyds case had no relevance to my claim.

Be interesting when they reply as to what they come up with.

GaryH, you always come up with a brilliant letter but unfortunately for me, it's always 24 hours after I've replied to Abbey.

Just as an aside, the AQ in our Mercantile hearing has been dispensed with so I got permission to write to the Judge and enclose the Abuse of Process order for his consideration. Will let you know what comes back.

[FoxyFiona]

Yep me too, they offered me approx 25% of my claim in letter quoting Berwick and Lloyds.

[GaryH]

25%!!!!!! PMSL!

You'd think that Abbey's solicitors would know very well by now that CAG members won't be fooled or intimidated by their underhanded tactics, would'nt you?

I would probably suggest that they try another one. This one is just making them look a bit silly!

[mariejader]

May I also refer you to claim numbers 7DC42005 and 7NB00229

Hey that's my claim fame at last

[GaryH]

Tis indeed.

Can I have your autograph?

[mariejader]

Tis indeed.

Can I have your autograph?

No one has ever asked me for my autograph before

This fame thing is going to be hard to cope with,

[Robdblynd]

Wow, Maria, just realised, I know a real life celeb.

[FoxyFiona]

When the autobiography comes out, will you give us all a mention

Gary H guessing you think I should send off the letter toute suite!

Just had an email back from the guy at BBC wanting my phone number!

[Robdblynd]

Had a voicemail from him today, wants me to ring him tomorrow.

Will report back as soon as we've talked.

[GaryH]

Excellent. I would suggest you mention Abbeys continuing abuse of court process and their clear strategy of damage limitation by intimidating claimants. Also quote the (at least) 2 cases where their defence has been thrown out by judges as an abuse of process.

Incidentally, they retracted the reference to Berwick v Lloyds in an e-mail to a user yesterday so it'll be interesting to see if they continue to quote it or not. conncat vs abbey *****WON!!!*****

[FoxyFiona]

Hi guys,

The guy at the BBC has just rang me, he was nice, just did about 5 mins on telephone, asked when I got the letter, if I thought they was trying to intimidate people, a few details about my case and if I am still going ahead. Prob more scarey tho wants me to email a head and shoulders photo, did warn him that may be more frightening than the bank charges

[Robdblynd]

Whooo, just spoken to the man from the Beeb, as per your advice Gary I got in the reference to CAG at least 3 times, mentioned both Abuse of Process Strike outs and the fact that the reference to Lloyds was an attempt to intimidate and threw in the fact that they'd withdrawn the comment yesterday to one user of CAG.

Also told him that no one would object to a reasonable charge but that what the banks are charging is 'not reasonable' and a clear attmept to make profits rather than cover their costs.

Hope he mentions CAG in the article, i tried to get it in as much as I could. Told him I probably would have been intimidated if I hadn't had CAG behind me.

He's going to use some of the wroding from my email in an atricle he's writing, so will watch out for that.

[FoxyFiona]

Do you know where the article will be, I didnt ask.......