bolivar vs Co-Op

[bolivar]

Hi all,

I have about 20 different claims to put in to different banks and cards, and amabout to start off with my first preliminary letter, to the Co-Op. I'm claiming a total of about £500 in charges, but I am very confused about what I should be doing about the interest on these. I've spent a long time looking at the various sections in the forum, and have put in posts previously, but have got conflicting advice.

Can anyone tell me whether I should be claiming any interest at this stage of the process, and if so, how much - unauthorised o/d rate, authorised rate, or statutory rate.

I've also tried to work it out on Vampiress' Complex Bank Charges spreadsheet, but I can't for the life of me work out how to use it, so I'm giving up on that.

Thanks people,

Bolivar

[ian cognito]

For the amount of your claim, i'm not sure that it would be worth going for anything but statutory interest which you claim when you get to the court claim stage, especially as this is your first claim.

The co-op tend to pay up pretty quick anyway so probably won't get to court, got mine just after LBA - good luck xx

[TETSUO]

I, like you, got really confused over the interest issue, so didn't bother claiming any.

[bolivar]

I've actually just calculated the amount of interest that they would owe (simple interest, not compound) if I was to claim at the authorised overdraft rate (13.9%), and it works out at £191, which seems quite a significant amount, so I am inclined to claim this if there is any way of doing it that won't jeopardise my claim if it ever gets to court. Any more thoughts about this?

Thanks

[ian cognito]

My understanding is, you can only claim the unauthorised overdraft rate where the charges took you over your authorised overdraft, is this how you have calculated it? the banks do tend to fight unauthorised interest claims unless they are very small.

No doubt someone will correct me if i misunderstand this.

[bolivar]

No, I used the authorised overdraft rate, as most of the time my overdraft was within my limit. Is that right?

[ian cognito]

I have read on here of people claiming the banks interest rate as 'unauthorised borrowing' (i.e. you did not give permission for the bank to take your money unlawfully), I don't think such a case has been concluded yet.

[bolivar]

Right, I've gone ahead and posted off my preliminary letter yesterday, total charges £560, and in the end I decided to go for interest too, £192.50, at the Co-Op's authorised overdraft rate (13.9%). I'll keep you posted about what transpires.

Has anybody had any result in terms of claiming interest as well as the charges at this stage of the proceedings?

Incidentally, my wife was on the phone to the Co-Op yesterday, and the nice lady at the call centre advised her ("personally, I'm not allowed to advised you on behalf of the bank") that we should submit our claim as soon as possible, as it may be that the banks are imminently going to come up with some formula where they only have to pay back part of the charges, not the whole amount. Does anybody know anything about this?

Happy Christmas to all,

Bolivar

[ian cognito]

Similar to what the CC companies are doing after the OFT made their £12 ruling, the answer is, if the charge is unlawful, then the whole of it is unlawful, not just the portion above their costs.

[bolivar]

Well,

We've had a reply from Sue Sheehan, Customer Relations Adviser, telling us that they are refunding £495.62 into our account as a goodwill gesture. In fact, the money had already gone into the account before we go the letter.

This does not even repay the charges we are owed (£560), not to mention the interest we are also claiming. The letter gives no indication of how the figure is arrived at, nor does it acknowledge that it falls far short of the amount we have claimed.

I have drafted the following reply, which I plan to send off tomorrow morning. Any thoughts?


"Request for repayment of charges

ACCOUNT NUMBER: ********

Thank you for your letter or 5th January. I note that you have refunded £495.62 to our account as a “goodwill gesture”. I will accept this payment as part settlement of my claim, but do not, however, regard the matter as settled.


You have not in your letter indicated how the figure of £495.62 has been arrived at. This figure does not even correspond to the total of the charges I am claiming from you, not to mention the interest I am asking for.


I am still expecting you to repay the remaining £255.61 of my original claim (£751.23).


I am also expecting you to comply with the timetable I laid out in my original letter for settlement of this claim. If I do not receive an acceptable settlement of the claim by Monday 29th January (allowing for Bank Holidays etc. since I originally wrote to you on 23rd December), I will have no option other than to initiate proceedings in the Small Claims Court, to recover this amount which I believe I am due.




Yours sincerely,"


Thanks again for your advice people,



Bolivar

[tintin_uk]

Bolivar,

My claim came through on Friday and my letter was identical to yours (though from another of the customer services team.) Like you, the amount of charges they came to was lower than my calculations (with no explanation), and they also didn't pay the interest.

However, the gap between what I was expecting back and what I got wasn't as large as yours so I wasn't going to bother writing back. I'd be interested to know what kind of response you get to your follow-up letter.

Good luck.

TT.

[bolivar]

Following further correspondence with the Co-Op, they are sticking to their guns, but in a very confused manner.

1. They are saying they have recalculated our charges, and that they total £603 (last letter, they said £503), of which £192.50 were previously refunded (i.e. at the time they were applied), leaving a total of £410.50. The £495.62 they refunded in January was, they say, a mistake. I still make it that the total charges due were £560 (taking into account charges already refunded). I asked them to explain which items in my Schedule of Charges they were not accepting, but they have not responded to this.

2. In response to my claim for £192.50 interest at their own overdraft rate (13.9%), they have said that they "only refund interest at 8%", and that they have credited my account with £39.65 to meet this requirement. It appears that they have simply credited us with 8% of the total they have refunded, i.e. £495.62, not taking into account the number of years over which these charges have been accumulated at 8% per year.

Finally, they advise me that "failure to comply with the terms and condition (sic) of the account will result in us giving you 30 days notice to close".

I feel like giving up, how do you deal with these people, is this stupidity or deliberate obfuscation? I won't in fact give up, of course, and will be writing back.

Any thoughts on whether I should still go for the 13.9% interest, or whether I should accept their offer of 8%, once they have worked it out properly.

Their threat to close our account is rather vague, but what do we do if they proceed with this?

Thanks,

Bolivar.

[dx100uk]

well thats what they did for me [bump in the successes]
8% flat
better than nothing!
though i think phantam just got comp int?

dx100uk