OFT Statement on Bank Charges not Credit Card Charges

[adamski]

Hi All
Correct me if i am wrong but im sure i read somewhere and from letters from Lloyds who say they are in talks with OFT, but is it true the OFT are going to make another announcement in April about Bank Accoutn charges?
Probally lowering the charges to £12 like they did with credit cards
If so what will this mean for claimants?
Regards
adamski

[diabolical]

I don't know whether it's true and even if it were I don't think it will mean much to claimants. The banks would still have to prove in court that a £12 charge represents exactly what it costs them to deal with account breaches without any profit involved.

[Bookworm]

The OFT are indeed investigating bank charges as opposed to credit card charges. There is no date set as yet for an announcement, and my personal opinion is that April would be too early to get a decision, as they only launched their investigation a couple of months ago, and they usually take a lot longer than 6 months to come up with their response. It may be that because their last one was announced in April 05, someone got their wires crossed?

It is likely, especially in view of the c/c statement, when the OFT advised that the principle could broadly be applied across all financial institutions (a statement which sent ripples of dismay through the banking industry), that the decision will fall more in less in line with the April 05 one.

However, don't forget that the OFT didn't "lower the charge to £12", as you state. They specifically said that £12 was NOT to be seen as an acceptable level, and that only a court could decide what constitutes a fair charge. They also said that £12 was the threshold above which they themselves would take legal action, but encouraged people to pursue their charges through the legal system if they were unhappy with the level of charges levied.

So all in all, business as usual. Until such time either a precedent has been set in court, or the banks lower their charges to a level which truly reflects the loss incurred through our breach of contract, (otherwise commonly known as "when Hell freezes over"), we keep going, nothing changes.

	Bank Charges You should have started your claim for your bank charges by now. Don't wait. You should send your bank a Subject Acess Request asking for all personal data they hold on you - not just statements. You should calculate all of your bank charges and related interest as far back as 1995. You should send your bank a demand for a refund giving them 7 days. You should commence your legal action adding 8% statutory interest. If you wait for the outcome of the test case, you may not be able to claim like this. you may not be able to claim interest. You may only be offered the difference between the charge and the OFT "fair charge". The repayment scheme will try to limit you to refinds from 2001 only. A repayment scheme will not deal with any bank charges related defaults on the credit register whereas in a court action you can ask for these to be removed and to be compensated for the damage caused to you and your family by them. You should also write to the bank and to the CRA and put all charges related credit entries in disupte and warn them that you will want them removed from the Register when the test case is over. Warn them also that you are likely to be seeking compensation for these wrongful data entries. Full and final settlement Have you previously accepted a partial repayment of your bank charges in full settlement? You will still be able to claim the rest of your money back after the Test case is decided. Get all your information back to 1995 and put in your claim now.