I dont beleive it!! Here we go again!!!

[Matrah]

Hi every one,

Been happily following the advice found here in the forum, and just opened a nice shiny new A+L 'Premier' Direct Account, (3 months ago). I was having a load of hassle with 1st Direct and their astronomical charges, so opened this as a parachute a/c.

Any way had all salary payments and everything transferred over to A+L.
I had previously a £1000 o/d with 1Drct, but A+L only initiated a £350 o/d subject to monitoring the a/c over the first few months making things slightly tight.

To cut a long story short on 19th April they honoured a cheque for £10 that put me 52 pence over my limit (an honest, tiny miscalculation), for the luxury of them doing that, i was charged £25, now making me £25.52 over my limit!

I phoned them as soon as i saw it (within 24 hours) and they re-credited the £25 straight away. I even told the guy i would put a pound in the account on Monday and he told me not to worry as it wasn't a great amount. All sorted i thought!

Not wanting to mess up again, my partner paid in £120 (more than enough) in cash on the 22nd May to again cover two cheques that were due to hit the account. Bugger me, on the same day they applied TWO Unauthorised O/D fees for £25 each, when i challenged them they said they were for the 52 pence over sight last month.

They did however "as a gesture of good will" refund HALF of ONE charge (£12.50), and guess what; they paid the two cheques the following day and charged me again a £25 paid item charge.

I really don't know what to do if you phone them now no-one one the phone can make a decision, it has to be refferd to a Cust Svc Cntre, they have now written back to me saying "the charges are correct and made in line with other financial institutions."

I'm shortly going to get yet more excess o/d fees and no doubt all the other non paid items etc, to be blunt, i'm totally sh****d all because of a 52 pence oversight. Total cost to me so far is going to be hovvering around £150 for 52 little pennies.

I would reall like to write them a letter and try and appeal to their better judgement, but haven't got a clue where to start. I don't necesarilly want to start the heavy Subject Access Request approach as i don't want to risk losing the a/c so early on.

We are emigrating to Oz in September and really need this account as it is the only VISA debit account we have, needing to access funds over there to start with.

Any help wouild be greatly appreciated, thanks loads in advance

M&S

[Matrah]

Can anyone help with this one as we've just asked for a small extension on our O/D to cover these charges and they've declined us because we've been over (thanks to them), really stuck now!

[PPMAN159]

At he end of the day I do not think that any bank has a better nature so there is no real point in trying to find it to appeal to.

As far as they are concerned they have repaid you £12.50 and that is the end of the matter.

Therefore why not send them the preliminary letter requesting that they repay all of the charges levied?

PPMAN

[djweeble]

I would just start the ball rolling again, forget the S.A.R - (Subject Access Request), if the account is only 3 months old you probably have all the info you need on your statements anyway, and if you don't have them you can go back 6 months with the online banking.

Go straight in with the initial request for refund, then LBA and CC them when they refuse.

[Matrah]

Thanks peeps, was a bit worried if they shut the account down as it is the only one with a visa debit card, and we're due to travel.