Well, that's weird! I received a letter from MBNA today. I had asked for everything they had on me, including the original application and actual statements. I already had the statements that I had kept for accounting purposes, so I wasn't so bothered about those. However, the letter that came today said ... "you have been charged fees totalling £1809 in the past six years, of which £25 has previously been refunded. Therefore, as we would like to resolve this matter, we have arranged a further goodwill payment of £934 to be sent credited to your account. This is in addition to the previous goodwill payment of £860... blah blah" There are two odd things about this: 1. I didn't ask for the extra payment. I just asked for all the info to be sent to me so I could check it over. 2. They have caved in completely. In the letter, they have attached the same copies of transaction lists (not statements) that they sent last time, and my £10 cheque back... No application copy. Do you think this total collapse is something to do with that? I'm very happy they have paid up in full, but I feel like asking for the application copy again (just to be annoying!)

Just received this letter from Nat West. Any ideas what I should do? Is it now time to accept the offer? I asked for £5000 in charges. Thank you for your letter of 14 March. I am sorry that we seem unable to resolve your dispute with the bank over charges levied to your account. It is inappropriate for me to repeat our legal position regarding charges and fees. Our previous letter to you of 8 March made our position very clear and I am aware that you do not agree with the bank's stance on this matter. I am concerned that the inference of your letter is that you regard as unlawful the terms and conditions of your having an account, which includes the application of charge where appropriate. If this is the case, then we must consider that you no longer wish to hold an account with the bank. However, I would like to provide you with sufficient time to consider your position on this matter but if you do wish to terminate your relationship with the bank please confirm this to me in writing. Our offer to make you a payment of £3500 is an accurate assesment of the refundable element of the charges levied to your account. The bank will not refund the account service charges or transmission fees that you contractually agreed when you opened the account. I note from your letter that you may now wish to seek legal redress for your complaint. If this is your intention then I would ask you to present your court papers to: Blah Blah Yours sincerely, Elliott Porte

Thanks for the advice! I have asked them for everything they have on me now; in particular the original application & actual statements. I've given them 7 days to sort it out, so hopefully I'll hear something by the end of the week

I haven't added contractual interest, as I thought that was something I was supposed to do when making the court claim?

Thanks for the advice. I read the thread you mentioned Lazybones, but I'm not certain how it relates to me exactly. I'm a bit of a dunce when it comes to this kind of thing Are you saying they should have sent me my original application back? The items I received from them were the letter with the goodwill offer on it, a data protection act request slip and lots of pages of printed transactions. They didn't send the application or copies of my statements. On the letter it says "we have enclosed details of your statement information. On this occasion we have provided the information to you free of charge, as we have not treated your request as a formal data subject access request under sction 7 of the Data Protection Act 1998. Please find enclosed your £10 cheque payment. Should this information be insufficient for your purposes, and you wish to make a full data subject access request under the Data Protection Act 1998, please complete and return the attached form." I don't know why they just didn't send my statements like I originally asked. The good thing was that I had kept them all, so I was able to calculate my charges anyway. It looks like the best thing to do is accept as part payment and request the rest. Do you agree?

Has anyone refused a partial payment from MBNA and received the full amount instead? I have been told they are crediting my account with £850, out of the £2000 I requested. I have no idea how this figure was arrived at, but I am wondering whether I should send in a letter accepting it as part payment and requesting the rest? There is a bit of an ominous paragraph at the end of the letter I received, which is why I am hesitating... "You may know that the Office of Fair Trading issued guidelines in April 2006 for the level of credit card default charges. MBNA disagrees with the OFT's interpretation of the law and continues to maintain that its default charges have always been fair, legal and transparent. However, we decided to reduce our default charges to £12 with effect from 28 June for late payments and returned payments, and 28 July for overlimit fees. You will have received notification of the changes to the Terms and Conditions, which we expect you to honour. If you do not do so, we will have no alternative but to cancel your card and to formally terminate your credit agreement". I don't fancy having to pay back the outstanding balance at this point. Are they just telling me that I have to accept these charges in future, or that if I don't accept their offer they will terminate? It's a little ambiguous.

I wonder if anyone has some advice about what I should do about MBNA. I requested just over £2000 in charges to be paid back and received a letter from Stuart Johnson (Assistant VP) this morning. It contained the usual pap about saying their charges are fair etc. and then said that they would credit a goodwill payment of £850 to my account for full and final settlement of the complaint. I've noticed that there does not seem to be too much in the way of success stories for MBNA on this site. Soooo.... Deal or No Deal? Any ideas? I have half a mind to push it, but I'm not sure.

Received a VERY welcome letter today from Jeff Hartley of RBS/Nat West. My claim had gone in for £7,000 a couple of weeks back and the letter I received today basically said that they do not agree with the basis of my complaint, BUT they want to make a gesture of goodwill payment of £6,450. They want me to sign a form saying that I must comply with T&C and all charges in future (ie. continue to screw me over if I rebound DD/CHQs etc). If I don't, they will "reconsider" continuing with my banking facilities. This doesn't really bother me, as I cannot see charges at this rate continuing much longer, and I can always change banks anyway. Has anyone else had this letter, or similar? If so, by signing it am I signing my life away? I can't see any other conditions applied, so I don't think so - but I want to be sure. I'm not too fussed about carrying on with any action from this point, as I'm happy about the amount offered. Donation on the way, once this is sorted. WOO HOO!

I have been scouring this forum for a few weeks now, but can't quite see conclusive information about mortgages. I have a Halifax mortgage and there are some charges that have been applied on top in the form of Late payment fees etc. Can anyone tell me definitively - are we able to claim these back? Thanks!

Thanks!! I appreciate it. Claims are on their way today

I am about to send my claims to Natwest, Amex, MBNA, Capital One, and others. I have had a loan application from HSBC accepted but the papers have not yet arrived to sign. My question is: if I put in my claims, might HSBC find out about them and decide to deny my application in the end? Note: I am not claiming anything from HSBC, so I would hope that the confidentiality of my accounts with the other financial institutions would be... well, confidential! Any ideas? I don't really want to hang about and wait, as it seems that banks are starting to get more agressive.

As far as I'm aware I think I am just about ready to send my claim, but I just wanted to make sure that I would be able to claim all the parts on my original post. So from what I can see on the faqs, I should now be sending the Prelim letter (671-2-letter-preliminary-approach.html), requesting full payment - without including 8% interest. If someone could confirm that I can claim all the charges on my original post, I will get that off to them today. I'm really only unsure about the "Interest" one. Thanks for your help with this!!

Hi everyone! This is my first post to this wonderful site, and will definitely not be my last I have been sending out letters for statements to the various financial institutions who have turned the screw on me over the years, and yesterday I received some from NatWest. I nearly collapsed when I saw what had been taken in charges, but I managed to work them all out and come to a figure. I've been pretty crappy with my finance but now I have (better late than never!) come to my senses! Would someone be able to tell me if I can claim for all the following items below? I think I am ok, from the other posts I've read, but I just want to be sure and not make a twonk of myself: £937 - cheque return fee £3995 - direct debit return fee £50 - card misuse fee £1365 - referral fee £112 - unarranged borrowing up to oct 2002 £708 - unarranged borrowing after oct 2002 (I removed the Adv Gold fees from this) £692.77 - interest (this is the one I'm particularly unsure about) total - £7859.77 I'm not sure about what to do now - do I add 8% interest on this and send your standard payment request letter with the figure? Any help would be greatly appreciated!