Thread: Recieving scary letters, Should I accept?

Hi all,

This is my first post. I have recieved a letter offering me £225.00 (less than half of the original amount!

I am concerned about what they have wrote in the letter:o I'm wondering if anyone else has recieved such a reply and persued it further?

Here is part of the letter:

"May I say how sorry I am to learn that you feel the bank charges you have incurred are unfair. In your corresondance you have referred to elements which you feel support you claim. Barclays is aware of the information you have drawn to our attention. I must inform you, however, that we disagree with your view.

When an account is opened with us, our customer is proviede with a copy of the terms and conditions relating to the use of their account; including details of our charges. This information clearly explains our obligations to our customers, as well as their obligations to us. If we make any changes to the terms and conditions, we provide details of these changes to our customers in line with the Banking Code. Details of our terms and conditions, along with our charging tarrif, can be obtained at any of our branches, or via our internet site,
www.woolwich.co.uk/barclays.co.uk "


This is my original request letter:

I am writing to request you refund me the charges which you have levied from my account over the last five years.
I now understand that the regime of fees which you have been applying to my account in relation to Standing Orders, direct debit refusals, exceeding overdraft limits and so forth are unlawful at Common Law, Statute and recent consumer regulations. If you say that they are not, then will you please demonstrate this by letting me have a full breakdown of the costs to which you have been put by as a result of my breaches, in order to reassure me that your penalties really do reflect your costs.
Additionally, it has now been confirmed that your particularly high level of penalties are considered to be unfair per se by the OFT who reported on the 5th April 2006 and are therefore presumed to be unlawful in the absence of specific proof to the contrary.


I would draw your attention to the terms of the contract which you agreed to at the time that I opened my account. It is an implied term of that contract that you would conduct yourselves lawfully and in a manner which complies with UK law.

I am frankly shocked that you have operated my account in this way as I had always reposed confidence in your integrity and expertise as my fiduciary.
I consider that your repeated representations that your charges are fair and reasonable are deceptive and that they have deceived me into agreeing to pay them.
Your concealment of the true nature of your charges has prevented me from asserting my right until now.


I calculate that you have taken £440.00. I enclose a schedule of the charges which I am claiming with this letter.


I hope that you will enter into a sincere dialogue with me about this matter and I am writing this letter to you on the assumption that you will prefer to do this than merely respond with standard letters and leaflets.

I will give you 14 days to reply to me accepting, unconditionally, my request in principle and letting me know a date by which I will receive payment.

If you do not respond, or you do not respond positively, within this time period, I shall send you a letter before action, giving you a further 14 days in which to reflect. I believe that these targets are more than sufficient for a large company such as yours with dedicated staff and departments.

After that, there will be no further communication from me and I shall issue a claim at the expiry of the second deadline.


Many thanks,

Shandong






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This is the same letter I received from Barclays - simply file it and continue with the standard sequence of letters. Barclays do not seem to budge at all - in my case I have received no offer of any charges refund - you will end up taking them to court - and Barclays will settle days/week before the court date.

Do not be put off by them - read through this forum section, and you'll see you're not alone, that people have gone through the process successfully, (and as far as I know) no-one's gone into the court room yet.

Chin up - just follow the process to get your money back.

Almost every thread that I have read has the same on it. They are trying to scare you off. They don't want to pay, it is as simple as that. However, the fact that they don't want to go to court is on your side. They know and you know it. Don't accept. Carry on with the proceedings that is what I plan on doing when they enevitably send me the same or similar letter.