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dirkn19

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  1. Hi, I hope someone might be able to provide some general advice. I am trying to reclaim £450 in Platinum Card membership fees, I have already unsuccessfully been through their complaints process and they've sent me the FoS leaflet. 1 - I've had both a British Airways Amex card and a Platinum Amex Charge card (with flexselect credit) for almost ten years. The latter has a membership fee of £450, paid in December 2 - I hadn't actually used the Platinum Card for two years until April 2015 when I tried to use it to pay for a hotel abroad - declined, despite my statement telling me I had over £1000 of my £3500 Flexselect credit available 3 - I rang Amex, and they essentially told me that because I was a risky customer, they were declining to put through my charges. Yes, late last year I ran into financial difficulties and had problems making loan and credit card payments and this will have affected my credit file 4 - However, at no time did Amex tell me I can't use the card. There is no notification on my online account, and I have received no letters or phone calls, so this is the first I had heard of it 5 - In fact the card does work sometimes. It usually works for smaller (less than £20) amounts in supermarkets etc. Not always. Yesterday an £8 charge went through, today a £17 one didn't 6 - I wrote to Amex making a complaint asking that my card be downgraded to one of the free ones, and that as I had been sold a card I can't actually make full use of, that my year's membership should be refunded 7 - Amex has rejected the complaint saying I could only have a pro rata refund (which I guess would be £300 odd) and making me aware that they can basically stop me using it when they want as it says so in the Tcs and Cs I would now like to complain to the FoC. The basis of my complaint will be that Amex knowingly sold me a card membership I can't make full use of, and never told me that I can't fully use the card. Had I known this, I would not have paid them the £450 at the end of last year. I have two questions: 1 - There is £550 due to be paid next week, some of this is from the small purchases I have been able to make - public transport, small supermarket shops etc. The rest is from my flex select balance. I am in a position to pay this, but would there be any grounds for me not to, if I am disputing the account? Or would this make things worse and I should just pay up as normal. 2 - Because the Amex card seems to work for most smaller charges, does this in any way negate my complaint? The £450 membership is sold with various travel benefits, but as I discovered I can't actually use the card when travelling Any other advice of how I should approach this with the FoS is appreciated. Thank you for hearing me out, all being well I'll look to submit my FoS complaint in the next few days
  2. Thanks for the advice with this. I followed the whole complaints procedure, and they've now written back. Though they've decided not to uphold my complaint, they did say the following: "However as a goodwill gesture and in light of the costs that you have incurred by obtaining your loan, I am offering to extinguish your balance of £874.56 in full and final settlement of your complaint. Please contact our office within 14 days of the date of this letter if you wish to accept this offer" Obviously a result I'm very pleased with! I guess this means it's worth tying companies like this up in paper work and complaints procedures, to make yourself more trouble than its worth?
  3. Hi, I do suspect my complaint will be rejected. But I am hoping to make enough of a nuisance of myself so that a final settlement offer has a bigger chance of success. I'm not sure if that's a realistic strategy or not!
  4. Done - I've challenged them on a) not making the true cost clear to me when they followed up my online application by phone b) adding £12 penalty charges, which is not a true or accurate reflection of any cost to them c) not communicating with me about the charges or missed payments d) charging me more than 100% of the original cost, and that I believe they should be classed as a short-term lender by virtue of them being part of a network of payday loan companies. Thank you everyone, much appreciated. If / when I have to take this to the FOS I may be back!
  5. Thank you very helpful - as I don't have a great deal of experience with people like this, I'd prefer to keep it in writing so I'm not caught out. But I will start the complaints process, so at the very least they can see it's not going to be easy getting the whole remaining lot from me.
  6. I'd love to stop paying them, because even though I was an idiot to take it on in the first place (well I was desperate like so many others), it sticks in my throat that they can get 5k from an original 2k. But as I'm assuming these aren't the kind of people just to let it drop, I just need to figure out the right strategy that avoids escalating action on their part but also makes me trouble for them. It seems kicking the whole complaints process into gear followed by maybe a final offer a few weeks later seems the right approach?
  7. thank you, I appreciate it. I'd love to challenge them any way I can, even on small technicalities as I'm assuming they might be more willing to cut the £800 down that way? I'd also like to play for time for a bit as I'll be in better shape in a few months time.
  8. Thank you, really appreciate the reply. I am not sure I could prove that as I hadn't heard from them at all one way or the other (other than my CCA request), but I am up for giving it a shot anyway. Tactically I would like to see if I can make a nuisance of myself before trying to come to some final arrangement with them. I wonder if that's at all a realistic approach to take or if these firms just don't work like that?
  9. Hi, I'd really appreciate some advice on how best to tackle Ladder Loans. In summary I borrowed £2000, have missed a few payments but even so have paid them more than £4000. I'd now like to know whether a full and final settlement is the best option, or whether I can fight this and pay nothing more The details are as follows: 1 - Ladder Loans is part of Inventive Finance Ltd, which I've found out runs a network of payday lenders. I was offered £2000 in July 2013 on an 18 month repayment schedule 2 - The APR per annum is an eye watering 299%, meaning that according to the CCA (which I now have), I agreed to pay them £5031.36 for that original £2000! 3 - I made 15 payments of £279.82 on time, so I've already paid them £4192.80 4 - Due to further financial difficulties (problems with my business), I missed payments no 16 (end Nov) 17 (end Dec) and what would have been final payment no 18 (end Jan). They've added £12 penalty charges for each of the missed payments 6 - They've never written to me about these missed payments or about adding penalty charges, I suspect they have been trying to call my mobile though. I asked for the CCA about 10 days ago and it arrived on Friday. I'm now thinking of doing one of two things. 1 - Offering them a final settlement on the £862.56 they say I still owe, to get them off my back Or: 2 - Making a formal complaint and seeing if I can eventually take it to the FOS. I'd base this on them adding on penalty charges but not writing to me as well as the fact that I already paid them more than double. Am I correct in thinking that payday lenders can't now charge more than 100% of the original loan? Or did I read that wrong? Can a hugely inflated interest rate be challenged? I'd really appreciate which is the best of the two routes to go down. Do I have a leg to stand via the complaints route, or would I be best just offering maybe £300 (so a third of what's still owed)
  10. Exactly - sending me half a dozen odd letters in response to mine must have cost them more than £36 in staff time by now
  11. Hello everyone, I hope you can help re an exchange of letters I've had with Past Due Credit since October, that's now resulted in them making me an "offer." Essentially Past Due Credit claims I owe Three £36 from 2011. Things have happened as follows: 1) In October I received a letter out of the blue from Past Due Credit saying I owed Three £36, and making various threats if I didn't pay up. I don't recognise the mobile number they listed, though I have had a mobile broadband dongle in the past. However, this was pay as you go and Three never once contacted me to say my account was in arrears. 2) As a result I sent a letter asking them to furnish me with evidence showing I actually owed this money. 3) This in turn led to three rounds of back and forth correspondence, where I received what seemed to be short boiler plate letters back. Finally in December, they wrote to me saying they'd put my account on hold for 28 days while I contacted Three 4) Needless to say I didn't - should I have done? As it's Past Due credit chasing me for this, I didn't see why I needed to do anything 5) As a result, I received a new threatening letter in January. I replied, saying that as they'd not supplied me with any evidence of the debt, I would assume the matter is closed. 6) Now I've had an 'offer' reducing the payment from £36 to £28. My instinct is that they only make offers like this when they haven't got a very strong case, is that correct? How should I reply to finally get them off my back?
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