Hi, Hedgey, I phoned RBS today regarding the letter from the solicitior and spoke to a woman there who was trying to get me to agree to pay a reduced amount to what I owe the bank so that they could close my account, I explained to her that they shouldn't have passed the case to a solicitor whilst my account is in dispute but she just ignored me and kept going on about me accepting to pay 500 quid as a final settlement on the account. I asked her what would happen if I were to pay the actual amount that I owe and she said that my account would still be closed, so basically they just want to close the account asap. I told her I had been made an offer by RBS for the bank charges and that I am going to respond in the next few days, I think I am just going to accept their offer of 624.00 and let them close the account....... Spikey

Hi, thanks for your reply, if thats right that they cannot pass on my account to a DCA whilst it is in dispute do you think I should contact them and point this out? I have phoned them a few times when I received letters regarding the overdraft limit and told them that I was awaiting a response regarding these charges and that I wasn't prepared to pay any more money into the account whilst it was just being taken out in charges and until the dispute was settled and now they have hit me with a letter from a DCA..... Spikey

I have received a letter from RBS after sending a preliminary letter making me an offer for bank charges, due to what has been happening recently I am unsure how to proceed, the offer is for 624.00 although the claim was for about 1100.00. Another thing is, my account has now gone over my agreed overdraft limit of 650.00 due to bank charges and yesterday I received a letter from a debt recovery agency threatening me with action if I don't repay the overdraft. any advice greatly appreciated. Here is the letter I received, the reason it refers to a previous letter is that I didn't receive the first letter RBS say was sent. We refer to your complaint about bank charges. We wrote to you recently making you a goodwill offer in full and final settlement of your complaint about these charges. We believe the charges are fair, transparent and lawful. Since we last wrote to you, the bank (and several other banks) became involved in legal proceedings with the office of fair trading (*OFT*) about bank charges which we believe will resolve the legal issues on the fairness and legality of your bank charges. We have asked the Financial Services Authority (*FSA*) to suspend the normal timetable for dealing with bank charges complaints and the FSA has agreed to this request subject to conditions that protect your rights. However the goodwill offer the bank made to you still stands and you can accept or reject this offer. If you decide to take up this offer you must contact us within 2 months from the date of this letter. You should be aware that if you accept this offer, this will be in *full and final* settlement of your complaint. This means that it is unlikely you would be awarded a further sum even if the test case indicated that you could be entitled to a potentially larger amount. Though this does not preclude you asking for repayment of any further charges if the court finds they are unlawful. If we do not hear from you within the specified 2 months, we will assume that you have decided to reject this offer and await the outcome of the legal proceedings with the OFT. This means that the bank's offer will expire(i.e. can no longer be accepted by you) and we will reconsider your complaint once the test case is resolved. We can assure you(in that instance) we have registered and stored your complaint. Please retain your bank records, as this will make it easier for your to support your complaint on resolution of the test case. Once the legal proceedings between the OFT and the banks finish, we will resolve your complaint as quickly as possible and apply the (test case) principles. This may produce a larger or smaller figure when compared with the current offer. We are sorry that we have not been able to respond in full to your complaint now, but we (together with the FSA and the OFT) think that it is necessary to resolve the key legal issues before we decide how we should respond to your complaint. Obviously exactly what will happen next will depend on the courts. We do not know how long the case will take - we have promised to proceed as quickly as possible but inevitably given the importance of the issues being considered this may take many months to finally resolve. But we can assure you that once the legal proceedings are completed we will resolve your complaint as quicly as possible. If at that stage you do not agree with our conclusions you will of course be able to refer your case to the Financial Ombudsman Service (*FOS*) (or to the courts) Given this court case we have asked both the FOS and the courts not to proceed with any other case they are hearing until the test case is resolved. FOS has indicated that as a general proposition it will indeed not proceed with cases which rely on the legal issues being considered in the test case. Similarly, you should be aware that if you choose to issue a claim in the County Courts, "the master of the Rolls" (in England and Wales) or "The Lord Chief Justice" (in Northern Ireland) has, at our request, issued a notification to the County Courts suggesting they stay proceedings about bank charges until resolution of the banks' proceedings with the OFT. Alternatively the bank will immediately apply to the Court for an order to stay your action until resolution of the bank's proceedings with the OFT. We will keep you updated appropriately about the proceedings with the OFT. You can also check the latest position on our website at Overdraft charges update- RBS - The Royal Bank of Scotland The FSA requires us to ensure that any bank charge complaint will not be adversely affected by the delay in dealing with it. For customers for whom Scotland is the most likely jurisdiction: In particular, your right to refer your complaint to the FOS will not be affected. The FOS provided a convenient alternative to the courts, and is free for customers. However, if you nonetheless wish to continue your claim through the courts in Scotland, you may wish to seek advice on filing a claim now to protect your rights in prescription although you may have to pay a fee. If you have any further questions or would like an update on the latest position regarding proceedings please check our website Overdraft charges update- RBS - The Royal Bank of Scotland or call us on 0845 3030 442.

Hello I decided to call RBS before I went ahead with a court claim just to check that they had received my LBA and spoke to a friendly lady there in the complaints department in Edinburgh who informed me that they had sent an offer letter out on the 14th May. I still haven't received the letter but it can take a while to arrive seeing as I am abroad. She told me that the offer was for £670, the actual claim is for £1081.47 I didn't say anything about the offer except that I would respond when I receive the letter. Spikey

Hi canobeans same here, the only reason I have gone over the agreed limit is because of their charges. I am ready to take them to court, I think !!! can you give me any advice about using MoneyClaim? Regards Spikey

Hi, unfortunately I have to write that after sending a preliminary request and a letter before action RBS has not responded to either, except to send me a 'Formal notice of intention to file a default and to take action to recover debt' the reason being that I have now gone over my agreed overdraft limit. I sent the LBA 4 weeks ago saying that I would give them 21 days to respond. The letter says I have to make arrangements to pay the debt within 28 days or my account will be handed over to a credit recovery agency. Would it be an idea to contact them to confirm they received my letters? I did send them recorded delivery or should I just proceed with court action? either way I am going to transfer some money to the account to bring me back within my limit. Advice greatly appreciated Regards Spikey

Ah ok I thought there might have been some legal stipulation that you needed to be living in the UK to make a claim. I come over to the UK fairly regularly so it wouldn't really be a problem. I just hope it doesn't have to go to court although I am prepared to take it that far Spikey

What exactly is the problem with me filing a court case, is it the fact that I would need to be living in the UK or that I would need an address there? if it is the latter then it's not a problem as I do have an address in the UK. Anyway i'm going to proceed with the LBA Thanks Spikey

Hello again, I sent a preliminary approach letter on the 15th march to the RBS Edinburgh office stating in the letter that I would give them 21 days to respond, I changed it from the 14 days in the template letter because I am writing from the Netherlands but I still haven't heard anything. I sent the letter recorded delivery. Would it be an idea to phone them before I proceed with the next stage? Spikey

please help, finances definitely aren't my strong point :confused: I thought I had this all worked out, I have filled in the spreadsheet using the charges and interest amounts from my statements but now I have checked it i'm not sure if I have done it right, I have read alot on here but there is just so much information it's not always easy to follow. I have an interest paying current account with the RBS and so I have filled in the chg amounts and int amounts from my statements, the chg amounts range from 15 to 38 quid. when I look on the advice of service charge statements it says these are a maintenance charge, am I right to fill in the whole amount on the spreadsheet or can I not claim the whole amount back? the amounts aren't broken down on the advice sheets, it just shows the whole charge amount. Also on the spreadsheet I know when i'm filling in the interest charges I put the date the interest was charged to, eg if it says int to 25 mar, I fill in the 25 march and put my balance on the 25 march, but when filling in the chg amounts do I also put the chg to date or the date it was taken from my account? the notes on the spreadsheets are somewhat conflicting. Spikey

Hi Having spent some time reading posts I am finally ready to send a preliminary letter. Would it be better to send it to my branch or to the address below that was mentioned in the RBS contact details? Spikey ROYAL BANK OF SCOTLAND PLC 36 ST ANDREW SQUARE EDINBURGH EH2 2YB

Hello again, it's taken some time but I think I am finally ready and feeling confident enough to send a preliminary approach letter. I filled in the information from my statements into the compound sheet v1.9 and if that is correct they owe me around 760 quid. When I send the letter do I send a print out of the compound sheet? if so which parts do I need to send is it just the notes page and the charges & interest page? Also another question, on the notes page, at the top where you fill in the interest rate and apr rate, which do I need to fill in? these don't actually make any difference to the calculations from the spreadsheet do they? Regards Spikey :rolleyes:8-)

Hi again, I am currently filling in the spreadsheet specifying the charges, I am using the one from Mindzai, one question tho, when filling in the interest charges and the interest period date, for example: 'INT TO 23SEP A/C' do fill in the balance of my account on the 23rd september or the balance on the date the amount is taken from my account? Kind Regards Spikey

Hi I have read through the FAQ and am now ready to make a preliminary approach to my bank, the only thing is I am not sure which spreadsheet I need to use from the library, there are quite a few of these and it is not very clear which to use, I would be grateful if someone could clarify this for me. Kind Regards Spikey

Hi sorry I wasn't very clear about the royalties account question, I noticed in the spreadsheet that you posted a link to that they overcharged you for the royalties account monthly charge, they appeared to have done this to me too, I noticed they have taken 20 pounds a month instead of 10 from my account, I am presuming this is the royalties account charge as there are no deductions for 10 pounds. Spikey