Thread: Letter from Barclaycard.

The OFT said that they would take action against financial organsations charging over £12. They didn't say that charges under £12 were fair, they have simply left it to consumers to decide what is fair so consumers can make their claim on that basis. The OFT said it would be for the courts to decide what is fair and what is unfair.

From all I have read of the posts on this site, and that is a lot, anything from £0.50 to £2.50 per charge is considered fair by the consumers here. However, some members are claiming the whole sum on the basis that the penalties are unlawful. My personal view is that I have agreed to cover the bank's reasonable costs so when calculating my claim I have deducted a sum from each penalty to allow for what I consider are the bank's costs. If the charge is a £20 overlimit charge then I would allow £1 for the bank's costs (I reckon £0.50 actual plus their reasonable margin) leaving £19 to be claimed.

In my opinion, no-one who thinks a fair charge is £1 should be put off their claim by receiving a "we are reducing our charges to £12" leaflet.

I received the same letter by Barclaycard saying that they are reducing the fee to £12.00. But ALSO it said that my interest rate for borrowing increases to something like 25% if I remember well. They are recouping unfair profits in different ways.

£12.00 is still too much for administration charges. At the end of the day, why do they authorise transactions (other than interest) over limit? they have a real-time system that shows the available balance and includes pending transactions. They share a great deal of the responsibility by intentionally allowing overlimit transactions.

The basis for claims on this site are because they are unlawful terms in a consumer contract. As the contract term is unlawful then ALL money paid under it should be reclaimed. They have missed their opportunity to charge you a reasonable fee for these breaches so you shouldn't deduct a reasonable fee from your claim. Reclaim ALL of the money.

It is a matter of personal choice.

Personally, I agreed to pay the bank their reasonable costs in running my account so for all my claims I will deduct what I consider to be their reasonable costs (i.e. reasonable costs based on numerous discussions on this site, not just my own view). I think it is a matter of principle that the bank is allowed a reasonable sum and the law recognises this.

Ultimately, I am not going to stand infront of a District Judge, or any other, and say in all fairness that the bank should end up with nothing.

Perhaps to be strictly accurate, one would claim all charges and the bank would respond with a counter claim for their reasonable costs. Is that your line of thinking? I just think I am coming to this as an average Joe and part-time genius, but I am not expected to know every nuance of the law, just to do what is reasonable and fair.

Considering just for a minute, a bank account rather than a credit card; if your overdraft facility gets rammed with unlawful bank charges then ALL charges (other than the monthly account fee and charges that would have occurred anyway) after that point should be recovered. I suppose the nearest credit card equivalent would be to claim back ALL charges after an increased credit limit soaked up more penalty charges than the first limit could bear.

Originally Posted by Bean

...Personally, I agreed to pay the bank their reasonable costs in running my account so for all my claims I will deduct what I consider to be their reasonable costs... I think it is a matter of principle that the bank is allowed a reasonable sum and the law recognises this.

Ultimately, I am not going to stand infront of a District Judge, or any other, and say in all fairness that the bank should end up with nothing.

...Considering just for a minute, a bank account rather than a credit card; if your overdraft facility gets rammed with unlawful bank charges then ALL charges (other than the monthly account fee and charges that would have occurred anyway) after that point should be recovered. I suppose the nearest credit card equivalent would be to claim back ALL charges after an increased credit limit soaked up more penalty charges than the first limit could bear.

I have refined my view on this. I now think that for a credit card, as soon as penalty charges exceed the minimum payment, the credit card issuer is surely responsible for any problem you have with making at least that minimum payment - so deserves to hold on to NOTHING of the resulting overlimit charge or late payment charge. In plain terms, if the first charge(s) had not been levied, then funds would have been available to meet later minimum payment(s).