Hi all,

Sorry to bother you but I'm after a bit of advice regarding an old Barclays account.

Heres the story...

My partner and I had a joint account with Barclays many years ago (2004) of which we ended up having an overdraft of £2170.

Due to various reasons we ended up pushing it to its limit every month

and eventually came into a bit of financial hardship but we struggled on as you do.

Then in 2008 I was sadly made redundant.

This is where things went terribly wrong.

We struggled on for another year incurring fees left, right and center

but we just got by until it all got too much and we went to the CAB for help.

They kindly went through a financial statement with us and contacted all our creditors with repayment offers

of which some have been paid off and some are still running.

We also put in a claim for bank charges on our Barclays account,

asked them to freeze the account as we were in financial hardship,

destroyed out bank cards and sent them back with our cheque books

as advised by the nice lass at the CAB and opened a new basic account with another bank.

Barclays sent us a letter shortly after (28th August 2009)

saying that they were sorry to hear of our financial hardship

but they considered their charges to be "lawful, fair and transparent"

so were throwing out our complaint on that front.

They also refused our offer of £10 a month repayment towards our outstanding debt.

Then a month later we received another letter

RE: our financial difficulty claim stating that they have accepted our claim

and will be paying us £585 as a "goodwill gesture" and closing our claim.

This is where things get really messy.

At that time my wife was sadly diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.

I have an anxiety disorder which is getting better now but back then meant my wife dealt with all the paperwork, bills etc.

To cut a long story short (too late, I know lol) this account has ended up being forgotten about until now.

I decided to get a copy of my credit report and was stunned to see that Barclays had been putting

an entry on there every month for years.

I'm guessing they have done the same with my wifes credit score too.

Is there anything I can do about this?

Also, what was originally a debt of £2170 because of the interest and PPI they have been adding every single month

has now reached a total of £5162 and is still going up by over £50 a month (£17.36 a month PPI + interest)

despite us requesting them to freeze everything and not using the account for years.

I am still out of work due to my anxiety but also because my wife is needing more and more help around the house

as her MS progresses so I've pretty much become a house husband/father.

She has always worked part time in Tesco but I'm unsure as to how long she can continue working.

As of right now she has been off work for the last 2 weeks with a relapse

that has left her numb down one side of her body and very wobbly on her feet.

Any help on which direction I should go would be great.

My anxiety is getting better now and I desperately want to step up and start providing for my family again,

being a decent father/husband and taking everything off my wifes weary shoulders

but first I need to get our current situation under control and hopefully repair some of the damage

this has done to our credit reports.

Many thanks.

Hi welcome to CAG,

Does this account show as defaulted or late payment markers??

As to the PPI do you consider that it was mis sold to you? Have you claimed on it?

Hi there. Thanks for the reply. The account has a load of late payment markers against it. With regard to the PPI I plan to file a claim against that one as my wife thought it was a clause to getting the last overdraft increase we requested on that account.

Hi Svee,

I'm interested to know why the PPI did not pay out when you were made redundant. Any explanation please.

The timing of events is important here. If the bank continued to add interest and default charges AFTER they were aware of your Financial Difficulties, you have the right to ask that they refund these charges. See here for more about this subject and the duty that the bank has re The Lending Code - http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/content.php?557-Letter-for-an-application-for-consideration-for-hardship

Hi there. Thanks for the reply. The account has a load of late payment markers against it. With regard to the PPI I plan to file a claim against that one as my wife thought it was a clause to getting the last overdraft increase we requested on that account.

Is this a current account with an overdraft.?

Slick132: Hiya. All I can claim is pure stupidity on the PPI/redundancy thing. My wife used to sort all this kind of stuff and its only since I've been going through old paperwork that I've found out we even had it *hangs head in shame*

BRIGADIER2JCS: Yes, it is a current account with an overdraft.

Do you recall, or do you have copy letters which show, if you made the bank aware of your redundancy at the time when it happened.

:=)

Hi all. Long time no speak. I'm in need of some more advice if possible please...

After my last post on here (almost a year ago) I had a bit more trouble with my anxiety and depression which caused me to unfortunately bury my head in the sand a little with regard to this account/overdraft with Barclays. Its not something I'm proud of but I'm getting better although I'm still terrified of telephone conversations for some stupid reason. I have found a job as a tattooist although I dont start it until christmas time so I am still a stay at home dad for the time being. I'm hoping come xmas my wife can quit Tesco and concentrate on keeping her MS at bay and I can finally get us off benefits and start paying my way again.

Anyway, I have been trying to get Barclay's to help me out since May this year but to no avail. I wrote to them stating my financial problems, pointed out everything that had happened as listed in my first post above but got no response. Shortly after that I put in a claim for a PPI refund as both my partner and I are sure we wouldnt have qualified for it at the time what with my anxiety and her MS to which they have replied and of course refused our claim saying that we applied for PPI at the same time as our overdraft in a branch and that the person there would have explained everything to us that we needed to know. We are sure she didnt and said it was a clause to get the overdraft we were after but of course we dont have any way of proving this. They also said they would be stopping the PPI policy/payments effective immediately.

So here we are, present day and I've just got a statement for said account in the post and not only are they still charging PPI but thanks to their new charges my £50 a month that was being added in interest, PPI and charges has now become £85.67pm. It just gets flippin' worse! *facepalm* So what originally was a little over £3k dept currently sits at £5624.12 thanks to all the charges etc. Its getting out of control :/

I'm not trying to get them to forget about the whole lot or anything. I would just like them to put it back to the £3100-ish it was when we originally asked them to freeze the account and sort out a repayment plan and actually freeze it so we can start paying it off.

Thanks for any help or advice people. Forums like this with people willing to give up their time to help people out are a godsend. You are all awesome

Aside from PPI reclaiming

You may want to ask for advice re BCOBS

Hi Svee,

Did you use the link about the Lending Code when writing to the bank about your financial difficulties ?

Also, in post #7, I asked if, and when, the bank knew about your redundancy. Let us know as this may be important.

Hi Slick132. Yes I did indeed use the link you kindly provided. I have been through all my old paperwork from when I went to the CAB but unfortunately I dont seem to have a copy of the letter they originally sent the bank. I believe they said I had been made redundant as we enclosed a financial statement on which my earnings would have said zero but alas I have no proof of this.

Hi Svee,

The reality is that you have to start a complaint with the bank, and then follow it through.

The bank is NOT going to wipe £2,500 from your debt without a battle. You need to keep on at them in a sustained manner.

What did they say in response to the complaint about their charges and your Financial Difficulty.

What did they say exactly when refusing to refund PPI.