Mizzpy,

Yes to both questions.

Good Luck

Janus,

I did post a reply, this computer is only a year old, and is already getting tempermental, so when I hit the submit reply button, it vanished! I have a parachute account, I had two accounts still open with N-Wide, stopped using them for the same reason that I have stopped using A&L. With N-wide they cleared out our current account to pay off a large chunk of their credit card that we had, the bank charges just kept on mounting up with N-Wide as a result of that. Took me ages to get that mess sorted out. And it's quite hard keeping 4 accounts open now, even though one account with A&L is not in use, the other still has some dd's going out, and knowing A&L for what they are, they have to fed, otherwise----!

We will fight them on the beaches etc, and we certainly will not roll over and SURRENDER.

The older we get, the more determined we get, A&L "Watch This Space"!

I've still got a full head of hair even it has got lighter. Pity about the rest of me, one sister calls me 'Chunky' the other-------------'Squarebob'

Night Ladies, Yes I do believe in Fairies! xxxx

bump

Or the Hussle!

Ha Ha,

John Travolta-------------------eat your heart out.

What about the birdie song?

Let me know if you got your messages other than those on threads?

Night Night, xxx

Well with the advice of Janus, hopefully I'll be able to start my own thread. Never was one for sewing!

Brief history (for those starting, halfway there or in Limbo):

S.A.R sent 9.3.07. Statements received 24.3.07. Pre-Lim letter sent 1.4.07. Fob off letter received 9.4.07. Filled in and filed NI form on the 24th of May. Acknowledged by Wragges on the 4.6.07. Received offer on one account on the 4.6.07. Letter of rejection sent on the same day. Defence papers received 16.6.07. Allocation Questionairre received 19.6.07. Wragges filed theirs on the 20th of June, I filed mine on the 25th. Only word I have had so far is a letter from A&L to say that as they had not paid a cheque for £14.98 they had now charged me £34 plus a further £25 to be taken on the 29th of June for going over my little overdraft, which I might add consists solely of incurred 'knock-on' bank charges.

In their defence paper, paragraph 22. Overdraft/Set-Off. It says the following:

In any event, if at trial the trial of this action the Claimant holds overdrawn accounts with the Defendant, then even if any money is due to the Claimant by way of refund, then the Defendant is entitled to and claims to set off the sum refunded against the overdraft sum then outstanding on that account(s) and owing by the claimant to the Defendant.

Talk about wanting their cake and eating it. If there were no charges etc, then there would have been no overdraft owing. I know I could have solved this problem by paying it off, but I did, twice, now I am trying to keep it below the 'cut-off' point. The account is not used, and the cheque for £14.98 was one that got sent out at the beginning of February but was not presented until the 6th of June. Unknown to me A&L had taken out a £25 Unauthorised Overdraft Charge on top of the £5 overdraft charge so this put this account just on the edge. If they had of honoured this cheque I would have only been overdrawn by £4.50.

So I hope the above will be of some use to some one.

Stay lucky

Squarebob

Oh God Alice,

You make me feel like a little boy . I started on computers when they had that 'green' screen and you had to try and remember what to type in just to open up a programme. Now windows makes that bit easier, but it is the rest of it that confuses me.

Duck Egg down here (lass) is a Proper Charlie down South.

Squarebob

Thanks Janus,

Computers!---- Makes you wonder how my old boss 'Scrooge' done without em let alone no coal on the fire!

Thanks for the tip, my two fingers have got blisters on em. My son goes to Manchester Uni to do a Business and I.T course in September, he finds all this computer work easy-peasy, Me? I'll stick to what I know.

Now I'm off to do a bit of sewing!

Alice,

Should call myself ' Le Lapin Blanc' (I think!)

Thanks for your message, 1st I have had, it gets quite lonely here on 'Boot-Hill'.

'Bump' I always wondered why that was put on different messages, only bump I knew was on the dance floor! Alice I don't even know how to start a thread (and keep finding it), I just have to hook onto everyone else's messages to get my little bit in, as for 'drag and drop' and bump, 'oooh'.

But I am frantikly trying to find a way of getting your message out for some one who knows what they are doing. Alice you have done at one stroke, what i wanted to see being done when I first started on this journey, (seems like a lifetime ago), 'Pool our information'. This way we can see what really is going on.

Good luck, keep in touch. your little white rabbit xxx

Stay Calm!

Remember the time when nothing was recorded, and we all 'blew our top'? Now whoever you phone, you get the message that, "This phone call is recorded for training purposes etc". so temper has to deflate, otherwise you get done for verbal abuse.

So how do we vent our feelings now?

Sorry Alice,

Another bit different to yours. Paragraph 20. In addition, the Claimant cannot claim charges which had not been incurred at the time of the issue of these proceedings. Therefore, any claim for charges incurred at the time of these proceedings. Therefore, any claim for charges incurred on or after 24th May 2007 must fail.

If your'e looking in Wragges-----------------double raspberry

Hi Alice,

My defence is only different in two sections;

Paragraph 9. It is denied that the Social Security Administration Act 1992 has any application or relevance to this claim, and that part of the Particulars of Claim should be struck out.

Failed Transaction Fee. This is where the customer (the Claimant) presents an item for payment that the Defendant was or is not prepared to pay. This is currently charged at £34 per item presented.

Signed by Clark Antony Sargent. Partner etc.

Did mention to the 'Boss' of C.A.G that a library of these defence's would not go amiss. (No reply yet). Helps to calm the wobbles down, for those who have never received one before, just as you have for me.

Squarebob

Hello Wobbles.

Seems like A&L are slapping on charges with a vengeance, and of course deserve all the retribution they get.

I thought at first that it was A&L's policy to keep slapping charges on for the least transgression (phew). It's not; it's their computer, there is no Manual Intervention or even common sense anymore. If there were, you, me and the rest of the world would not be sitting here pulling our hair out. When I incurred charges, I had to borrow money to avoid the charges spiralling out of control. One account with A&L is not used, the small overdraft on it consists of bank charges, the other week a 'lost' cheque from February was presented, rather than pay the £14.98 for the cheque, they took out £25 for the 1 day unauthorised overdraft charge from last month, then charged me £34 for not paying the cheque, then when I looked at my statement, they are charging me another £25 for going overdrawn! And if any of that makes sense I'll eat my hat.

I'm off to take the cat for a walk.

Whatever happened to our 'Flexible Friend'

The customer IS always right was drummed into my head from the day I left school (we used slates then!) And I have carried that with me everywhere, it's probably why I am so polite to rude staff in shops etc.

:p

Whatever happened to our 'Flexible Friend'

Our local branch of the A&L, (as does the Nationwide and Halifax), has this new 'Super Dooper' 'all bells and whistles' machine in the branch that deals with everything instead of going to the counter, in our branch there are now only two windows left at the counter, as they would prefer you to use this wonderful machine, deposits are credited there and then with this machine, but outside at the ATM it is the following day, same with the letterbox they have on the inside of the branch. When this branch was being modernised, Friday thru Monday, I placed a deposit in the ATM outside to cover what they had already robbed plus to cover the dd coming back again, and it was over a week before they credited it to my account, it was only manual intervention on my part that stopped anymore of those stupid computer generated letters being received.

With the Halifax, I have to use their machine, even, as I once did, stood in their nice long line of customers, when I got to the counter she told me that she could not serve me and I had to use the machine, all my arguments fell on deaf ears, and when I asked to see the manager, he told me to do the same thing, and if I was not happy, find another bank!

Remember the time when the bank's staff knew you and you knew them?

Morning All,

The sun is shining! I've done my washing and now I'm about to do some gardening, not the earthy type, but here among you flowers! I should have used the 'Gardener' as my alias instead of 'Squarebob', but that's what my sister says I now look like (body-wise) so who am I to argue with a woman. Enough of this nonsense and let's crack on. This is an answer covering most pm's above.

I started my ball rolling end of Feb this year after enduring a number of 'Knock-on'- penalty charges. Now it's the end of June and soon we will be into July, even though it's still 2007, it seems as if a year has passed by already. Since I have started my claim, the information coming through seems to have grown. First there was the C.I. should I apply it? and if so what rate? Should I say this in my letter, or should I say that, there was a lot of helpful information, plus a lot of conflicting information, and yes, it does seem as if your head is about to explode. I put my AQ in yesterday and spent a sleepless night wondering whether the judge would read my draft questionnaire and information sheet as, having dropped everything on the floor, the clerk just stapled everything together, took my fee and said goodbye. I even filled in my A.Q on line and printed it off rather than use the one the court sent, as I wanted everything to look as neat and professional as possible, and still ended up making a 'pigs-ear' of everything because the floor and the counter in the court office was wringing wet. Worry? I say stop, walk away for a day, then come back, hopefully things will look clearer. As for claiming C.I. that's a decision only you can make, if you do, it's only a 'pie in the sky thing' if you get it, it's a bonus' if you don't, you will still get the 8% awarded via the court. When you do include it in your 'Pre-Lim letter it must give some one quite a shock, especially when they see it broken down thus, charges, £437. plus interest £1,537!

I found a witness statement, that I will modify and use, like everything else I have done so far. The author has put in the following; he sets out that he is claiming C.I, how much and why. He then goes on to say that if the judge does not approve of this then he will then reduce his interest rate, in this case to 16% and once again sets out how much interest that would be, and again if the judge did not approve of either percentage rate, he would accept the 8% awarded by the court. The author used three rates of interest, his banks unauthorised and authorised rate plus the courts 8%. He attached 3 different spreadsheets with 3 different rates of interest and basically left it for the judge to decide which one he got. In our case, A&L have a fairly low rate of interest, so our drop would not be that big. At the end of the day, we would hopefully, end up with a lot more than we started.

So to pinch the words from a song. "Don't worry, be happy"

Have a nice day

Hy Jansus,

Just been looking thru your message, interesting bit about the partial offers we receive & reject. Mine arrived near enough the same time as their defence papers. And section 18 of their defence says; However, without prejudice to the above, the Defendant will refund and/or has refunded the Claimant's account part of each failed transaction fee to the extent of any excess above a debited charge of £12 per item. No word of dismay or otherwise from A&L re sending back their cheque, they must still know where I live because my statements still turn up on the doorstep.

I filed my A.Q today, decided to 'act soft' and send A&L a copy plus the attachments with an updated list of charges just to see if they need nudging.

Did you send them a Pre-Lim letter? If you did, did you include a schedule of charges? If you have done this, then no need to send the bank anything. If you have just jumped straight in by filing on-line prior to asking the bank for your money back, then I think some one more knowledgeable on these matters will post a comment.

Go to the Templates section, scroll down the list, 3rd from the bottom should read; Rejecting Offers by jonni2bad, open it up and away you go.

If not, try this site. Reclaim Unfair Charges from banks & credit card companies!

Also spend some time (as I do) following all the different threads etc, every one has been somewhere at some stage at some time and they all have a story to tell.

Well Wobbles, you really have got the Wobbles now!

I experimented with my one of my spreadsheets, as my claim was for £1,700, I changed my original 7.63% for your 29.8%, it made quite a difference, but not as much as yours, the reason for this was that my charges never started until 2003 and then it was only in dribs and dabs. In your case it looks as if you are starting from 6 years back, and that is where the difference lies.

Do not worry too much about putting that much interest down in the Pre-lim letter, after all it is 'Their' rate of interest, and not something you have just pulled out of a hat. I don't know which Pre-lim template you will be using, but in mine (from the reclaimunfaircharges.co website), there was a paragraph which went; Currently you apply interest at the rate of --% APR for unauthorised borrowing. I have applied the same rate to my request in accordance to consumer contract legislation, as you have unlawfully applied penalty charges that you had no right to, which therfore amounts to unauthorised borrowing of my money.

Hope this calms you down a bit!

The main advice seems to be, do nothing by phone, just deal with everybody by post using either Recorded delivery or 'Special Delivery', also keep a copy of everything you send.

There is a letter for rejecting offers in the Templates section.

Need any more help, just shout.

Oh Wobbles,

Contractual Interest really does work miracles, that's why the banks don't want anything to do with it. You're worried about your amount, some one posted recently that their charges were £5,000 but the interest pushed it to nearer £13,000 ouch!

When I did not not know what interest rate to apply, I used 28% and nearly fell of the cat!

So don't worry, just grin like the Cheshire Cat.