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Great News VIV16, It seems they have taken you a lot more seriously than me. They have requested a 1 month Stay to try and settle. They sent me a letter asking for an explanation of my figure of which I sent them and I have not herd anything from them since. My court date is this week sometime and the trick is I am out in South Africa sorting other stuff out and will have to send someone in my place...

viv16, firstly, apologies in the late response but unfortunately, I left to go on holiday and have battled to get the internet up and running until now.. Dial-Up is also very very slow where I am so you can imagine.. Well, I would say that the answers to your questions are all sourced in the FAQ’s, I am not able to find my particulars of claim as I am not on my pc. The fees in your case would be 120 GBP upfront upon filing the claim and then it will be 100 GBP when the fill out your questionnaire when the bank files their defence. There should be a couple of threads on this site that should give you a short text on what to write in the online version of the particulars of claim, you should be able to do a search. I am in the process of gather some meat on Capital One now so might get a few extra pounds back eventually.

Hi dj59, Well, from the looks of things, you have everything in hand. Their response seems to be generally the same as the one’s I have received although I am an individual. Personally, I would not worry too much of requesting a break down of the service charges as it would only delay the return of your money. However, in looking at their website to get an idea of their charges for these penalties, I could not find any explanations, so it maybe worth getting a break down of the charges. Good Luck.

Hi Stodders78, I believe everything you need to follow the claim through is on the FAQ pages of this website which also lists the template letters and information you need to recover your money.

Neildexter, Well, I just read through your post of Lloyds TSB defence and it is pretty much the same as what they sent me. I think the first instance thing was only something they recently introduced such as the cap on the amount they will take from your account each month being £80. I have record of them taking far more than this in a few months in the early days of having my account. I personally would not worry about the defence as they will very likely contact you when they submit their allocation questionnaire or even before in light of your low claim.

Well I filed the claim on the 22 May so I guess about 2.5 months. They currently are talking about a settlement which I envisage being paid by the end of the coming week.

Hi Ukdemon, I can say Lloyds won’t go to court if they can help it. You will pretty much expect their standard response, they will take you all the way to allocation questionnaire and then they might even request a 1 month stay to discuss a settlement which they currently doing with me. If you stuck on a particular section, then post it and I will try to help.

Hi Homershairdo, No, Lloyds TSB would not be that foolish, the above information is what I have gathered from this site in order to submit a counter defence to the courts against Lloyds TSB. Even if they fancied counter suing me, they would already be thinking long and hard about it as I have just successfully won against them in a Miss-selling me PPI in which they settled.

Zuzubing, Personally I would not worry too much about that, if they want to close your account in retaliation to your complaining, then you can report them to the FSA I think it is. Though they will have to give you 1 month’s notice of their intention in any event which should give you some time to complete the setup of the new account.

Hi steveoram1, Well you have sent off for the information under the Data Protection Act, all you need to do now is monitor the time it takes them and if this surpasses 40 days report them to the information commissioner, if not, compile a schedule of charges etc and then follow all the information on the FAQ page of this site as it offers a whole host of information and includes templates etc for you to edit and sent off. The fact that is with collections does not really make to much difference as I would see it. I would continue to make payments to the collections people and just advise them that it is being dispute but will continue. Basically if you have current agreements to pay them, you will need to honour them until the dispute is resolved in which time you will get your money back.

Hi Neildexter, Firstly don’t fret about it, I have recently submitted mine and will include a copy of what I used in my counter defence. The material is drawn from this website but of course I have edited it my self and re-worded it but you are more than welcome to use it. The people that discussed it, I think was dchurch but can’t recall precisely. I have gathered other materials and found all the sources etc so you will note the links etc. I hope to in the near future once my dispute is settled to build a complete page on this site with absolutely everything. Here goes. 1. The defendant has never ‘made clear specific reference highlighting such charges’ referred to a service or a service charge in any of its letters or any other communication to me regarding charges in almost 6 years of banking with the defendant. Therefore the banks defence to these charges as not being penalty charges but rather charges for the supply of services is without merit. However, I refer to the banks own explanation of these charges on their website as detailed below. If it is not immediately apparent, I would point out that in the entire explanation, there is no mention of the word or wordings service. “If you make a mistake We understand that everyone can make mistakes from time to time. This is why we won’t charge you fees the first day you go overdrawn without agreement, as long as you haven't done so in the previous 12 months. If you go overdrawn without agreeing this with us We charge a higher rate of interest for unauthorised borrowing and we display this rate in all our branches, and on our personal overdraft rates. We will also charge you for any unauthorised borrowing; details are in the following table. These will be charged to your account monthly. Overdraft excess fee Charges We charge this when you go overdrawn by £10 or more above any agreed limit, or by £10 or more without any agreed limit. We will charge this fee again on each day we make a payment for you that increases your unauthorised overdraft by £10 or more. £30 a day (maximum of 3 charges in any one monthly charging period - maximum of £90) Returned item fee Charges You'll be charged this fee whenever there is not enough money in your account to make a payment, such as direct debit, cheque or standing order. £35 We will write to you every time we are unable to pay an item, or the first time you go overdrawn by £10 or more without agreement. We use the balance on your account at the start of the day* to make decisions on whether or not to pay cheques and other items presented for payment that day. Please make sure you have enough cleared funds in your account at the close of business the day before the payment is due to cover any payments that you wish to make.” The source of which can be found at http://www.lloydstsb.com/rates_and_charges/current_account_charges.asp 2. The defendant’s Terms & conditions do not set out clearly ‘in customer friendly language’ for any consumer what services might be provided to a consumer where events of default occur. Those terms will therefore be construed in favor of the consumer and not the bank. 4. In the banks defense submitted to the court for this case, in point (2) it is noted that the agreement between the defendant and the claimant is a commercial contract and such any failure to adhere to the terms and conditions set forth would be deemed a contract breach and thereby providing for these charges in way of penalties. The charge leaflets make clear that the charges are payable upon the occurrence of an event of default. The liability to pay the charges arises immediately after the default occurs. The charges are not expressed to arise as a result of the provision of a service subsequent to a default, but immediately after the existence of the default arise. 5. Paragraphs 1.19 and 4.21 of the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) report on credit card charges. The OFT rationale applies to bank default charges and the bank is seeking to disguise them as service charges. The Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations (UTCCR) are concerned with the intention and effect of contract terms - not the mechanics. So it doesn't matter what the banks call the charges. If they look like penalty charges then it is more likely than not that they are. 6. The comments made to the treasury committee in which several major heads of banks were present, it was asked of Mr Goodman (Chief Executive, The Royal Bank of Scotland) of a situation with a customer and the discussion that followed clearly give reference to these charges as being default charges. “Mr Goodwin: In situations like that, sense would prevail I would hope, when you look at the bill. These charges are applied automatically; the system is applying them, so you do not know the full circumstances.” The source of which can be found in the Treasury - Minutes of Evidence THURSDAY 16 OCTOBER 2003, Examination of Witnesses (Questions 980 - 999) and the link is http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/cmtreasy/125/3101611.htm 7. The bank will have to give evidence of exactly what service is provided, how, by whom in respect of each and every charge’ and the reasonableness there of’ - when I know that the fees are applied automatically and immediately - and I know that some banks have already confirmed that they don't keep any records of any manual interventions. 8. The bank is a signatory to the Banking Code. Term 5.4 states: We will tell you the charge for any other service or product before we provide that service or product, and at any time you ask. By stating the charge is for a service, the defendant is bound by the code to tell ‘make me aware of such’ me before they provide the service. It is implied in this that they are to give me the option of whether or not I want them to provide the service – assumption that you want the service is not implied.

Hi Woundedog, Well, welcome to the site. I would generally advise you just follow the template letters and information on the FAQ page of this site as does seem to work. Any mention of the said test case, I have no doubt won’t assist you recovering these charges. Good Luck.

Hi Darkmick, Well, welcome to the site. I would say the situation sounds quite complex but just stop negotiations as you now know these charges are questionable and start the process of disputing them by using the abundant material on the FAQ page on this site. I personally would go a head with it as you have said that this debt is as a result of the unlawful charges being applied to the account. It will take a little time to sort out but is worth it in the end. You will even be able to get them to remove any miss-information added by them to the credit reference agencies. Good luck. I am sure the good people of this site will ever be ready to jump in and offer some useful insight.

Hi elsdon.sarah, Well both address essentially get to the same place. The local branch post will normally be sent to the Customer Care, Lloyds TSB, 125 Colmore Row, Birmingham B3 3SF address as it is all centralised now. To save time send it to Birmingham and then when they start writing to you, address it to the address at the top of their letter head. Good Luck.

Viv16, There is a spreadsheet on the site template page that should help work out the interest etc for you. You just have to amend it to reflect your charges... There are some notes on it there too. The banks solicitors have just sent a letter asking about how I calculated the charges so the intend to settle from the looks of things.

I think that if you send a new letter and mention that you forgot to include the payment in the originally request and pay for the new request, you should receive your information fairly quickly. Not too worry though it can be an easy mistake to make.

I guess the trick here is that the OFT made a statement to the affect that if a penalty charge is applied that exceeds £12, then the OFT would deem it unfair. But it also said that even the £12 is an absolute maximum.

Railroader, I have added a post to your original question but if you need any help or have more questions, please let me know. Good Luck with claiming your money back...

Railroader, Generally Lloyds won’t mind bending their rules to allow for more charges to be added to the account. Just claim it back the same way a lot of users on this site are doing.

Hi Rugbypete, No I don’t think it is a strategy and as far as I know, you should go ahead and report them if they have surpassed the 40 day limit. The one thing to note though, did you send them a payment for your request of £10 as they do not have to do anything until they get the payment. Though they would normally let you know and request the payment. Good Luck...

Welcome to the site, I am certain you will find all you need to know about claiming your money back from these banks... I am already at the stage where the bank wants to settle so this should give you some encouragement if you needed it. Good Luck.

Good Luck...

Good Luck. I am already at the stage of them wanting to settle though no further communication has been had from them. Just remember to divide up your claim to keep it under £5,000.

Firstly, don't worry; you have come to the right place to learn how to get your charges back. Since your charges are above £7,000, what the best thing would be to make a list of all the charges and split them up. Take a look at the FAQ on the site resource, this should give you a basic run down and answer most of your questions, then start by reading through the postings that relate to your bank and have a look at what other people are asking and that may also answer a few question.