Well...so much for responding positively!!! I have had this letter from the Halifax today: Thank you for your recent letter. As a gesture of goodwill I offered to refund six months worth of charges to your account, which you do not wish to accept. I confirm that we will not refund all the charges you have incurred on your account since opening your account. If you remain unhappy you can refer your concerns to the Financial Ombudsman Service as outlined in our previous letter. I'd like to remind you, if you wish to refer the matter to the Ombudsman then you must do so within 6 months of the date of our previous letter. Well...I didn;t actually say that I wouldn't accept the goodwill gesture, I said that I would on the understanding I would pursue the rest via court action. Should I bother getting into more correspondance with them on this fact or just submit my MCOL on Monday as planned? I am worred now in case I have blown it by not accepting!! The closer I am getting to MCOL day, the more I am worried that they will think 'ok, lets defend this fully' and use me as the test case!! ha ha!! Any help/ advice / reassurance gratefully received!!!

Hiya I wouldn't worry about this. I sent my DPA letter and didn't get anything, just letters saying they needed authoristion to deduct money, even though I had already given it, blah blah blah...then I went on hols, and forgot about it a bit and before I knew 91 days had passed and nothing. I sent the court letter and got the statements within 4 days, so hopefully you won't have to go that far. Hope you get your info soon. xoxoxo

Hi Katy For quickness, I would probably be tempted to send them another letter for the account, with another £10 chq and send it recorded delivery. I would also put on the end of the letter, that you would like some confirmation when this has been received, although you should be able to track it if you send it recorded delivery. The Halifax seem to like all these delaying tactics, so I would just recommend putting everything in writing, always with copies of any previous correspondance you have sent and always send everything recorded or get a certificate of posting which is also free!!. This makes it harder (although not impossible!!) for them to play silly b*ggers! xoxox

Hi Simon Pretty standard stuff with the Halifax, I had to send about 4 letters before I got my statements and they used all the delaying tactics they could to avoid it, sayiong I hadn't given them authorisation to pay trhe £10 fee etc. even though it stated this in the original letter...never mind, it will make it all the sweeter when we get our money back!! When filling in the spreadsheet, just put the date the amount/charge was taken from your account, which will show on the statement, and then list each charge, it doesn't matter if Halifax seem to have added a few together. On my Halifax statements, it just had charges as notified, so just put that as your description and that will be fine. I have had an offer of £900 and they owe me £1800, so am going to pursue it further and am sending my MCOL off next Monday. Remeber don't ad your 8% interest on at the stage you are at, you only add this if you go to the court action stage. (sorry if you knew this, better to be safe than sorry!!) xoxox

You go on the simple spreadsheet in the Templates Library and add the dates and the charges on there. (The description on Halifax Statements is usually 'Charges as Notified) Hide or delete the 8% interest columns, you only claim this at the court stage. Then fill in the Prelimninary request for payment letter, again in the Templates Library and post the letter and the sharges spreadsheet off together. This will give them 14 days to reply. Once these 14 days are up, the next stage is the letter before action, again in the templates Library which is send with another copy of your charges spreadsheet. I would recommed having a good look at all the letters in the library and the FAQs, as they do help the whole process to make more sense and give you a good understanding of what you are doing. xoxoxox

Hiya Rachael No don't contact them again. You have written to them twice now saying what you want (full refund of charges) and they haven't done this, so just stick to your timescales and go ahead with the MCOL/N1. xoxo

CONGRATULATIONS!!!! xoxoxox

Fantastic!!! Congratulations!!! xoxox

Looks fine to me Mike!! xoxox

Ha ha!! Very true!! All the best with it, I have a feeling your powers of persuation will work!! All the very best. xoxox

Hiya, The LBA is the Letter before action, so you send your preliminary request for the charges, with a copy of your schedule and give them 14 days to respond. If they haven't responded, you then send this letter, your LBA. This says you will give them another 14 days to respond and if not you will take action. The taking action bit is then you do the Money Claim On Line bit. Accepting their offer won't affect your charges of getting the rest, that is what most people in the sucessful claims thread seem to have done anyway. If you look at the rejection of offer letter in the Templates thread, it is all pretty clear. Looks like we are at the same stage! I got an offer today, but am sending them back my rejection letter today, saying I will accept £900 of an £1800 claim, but only in part payment and I wil be pursuing the rest etc. Hope this helps. xoxox

Well, I have read the templates and some more sucessful posts and have got my nerve back (well most of it anyway!)!! I am sending my rejection letter today saying they have until the 23 Oct (when my lba deadline is up) to respond 'positively'. I'll let you know what happens!! xoxox

Good Luck Lynette!!!, not that 'luck' is needed!!! Ooh in time for Xmas woul be nice wouldn't it!! xoxoxox

I am sooo pleased for you! I have just decided to reject my offer (£900 on £1800 of charges) and it is threads like this that make me keep going!! WELL DONE!!! Just a thing I have read on previous threads. It seems that if you claim more than once, the Bank is very likely to close your account. Sorry to appear negative when your thread was so happy, but I noted getting another account may be an issue for you, so just wanted to alert you to it. Congratulations again!! xoxox

Hiya Well I got it (or should I say the dogs got to it before me!..they must have known who it was from!) I will type the full letter below but I think it is a pretty standard one. They are offering me £900 of an £1800 claim. I didn't think they would offer me that much initially. I don't want to accept it obviously, but I must admit I am getting a little nervous now at this stage! Even though if other people are thinking of accepting, I say NO go on!! ha ha!! It is different when it is your 'turn' though!! I keep reading the threads in the Sucessful Claims bit though for inspiration!! Off to have a look at the rejection letters now in the library, so I'll have a good read of these and then no doubt come back with loads of Qs!!! Thanks all for your support!! xoxoxox Dear Springer Thank you for your recent letter. I am sure you will appreciate like other organisation, we incur costs for every transaction made. When we pay an item against an unauthorised overdraft or return an item unpaid, we incur extra costs regardless of the actual shortfall involved. We believe it is fair to pass these costs on to the accounts affected, as opposed to them being absorbed by other customers. Our charging policy is clearly outlined in the terms and conditions that apply to your account. In addition we are committed to complying with the Banking Code, which sets out standards of good banking practice. The terms and conditions of your account state that you must have funds in your account to cover your transactions. We cannot be responsible if you authorise payments against funds that are not available. You have requested information on how we calculate our costs for dealing with these transactions. Please note that we are not obliged under the Data Protection Act to supply this information, and as it is commercially sensitive, I regret to inform you that I am unable to comply with your request. We are keen to help you avoid and unnecessary charges by providing various ways to keep track of your account. You can do this by telephone banking on 08457 203040, on line banking (www.halifax.co.uk or www.bankofscotland.co.uk) or mini statements at cash machines. You can also contact one of our banking advisers at one of our branches. Ultimately it is your responsibility to manage your account. As a gesture of goodwill I would like to offer £900.00 which represents six months worth of charges on your account in full and final settlement of your complaint. I must stress that future charges will stand and we reserve the right to close your account if you do not manage it correctly. To accept my offer please sign and return the enclosed acceptance form in the pre-paid envelope. This may not be the response you were hoping for so, to comply with legislation, I would like to let ou know that if you remain unhappy you can refer your concerns to the Financial Ombudsman Service, they can be contacted by telephone on 0845 080 1800, or by post at: The Financial Ombudsman Service South Quay Plaza 183 Marsh Wall London E14 9SR You will find enclosed a leaflet providing full details of the Ombudsman service. If you wish to refer this matter to the Ombudsman, you must do so within 6 months of the date of this letter. Yours blah blah blah Then a form saying: I, Springer of, xxxxxx Confirm I accept the offer of £900 from Halifax in full and final settlement of my complaint regarding bank charges made on my Halifax account.

Reject it and go for the lot!! I don't know what 'formal' letters, if any, you have sent yet, as you seem to be getting preferential treatment;) , but You could have a look in the library template and adjust the rejection letter in there to suit your needs? Did you manage to get all of your bank statements so you can work out your exact charges? This may be a good starting point? (sorry of you have already done this!) Springer xoxox

Well, I posted my LBA on the 9th Oct and yesterday (11th) at work got a phone call from the Halifax to discuss it. That is the quickest response time I've ever had from them? I told them I didn't want to discuss it over the phone and as I was at work, it wasn't convenient anyway, so she said she would send me a letter in the post. I'm anxiously waiting for the postman now!!! I'll let you all know what it says...it won't be a full offer at this stage will it? Halifax usually let you take court action before they do anything? This is what I can gatther from other posts anyway!! xoxo

Great, thanks nona, it's on its way today!! x

I don't think there is one in the template, it would mean you drafting one up, by refering to the LBA and ROC letters in the library. That's why I thought it might be easier to just send your LBA tomorrow, followed by ROC Tuesday, that way you can just use the standard letters, if you are worried about drafting a merged one?

Whoops! Sorry, didn't mean to confuse you? I think you can just send your LBA as planned tomorrow, then send your rejection of charges (which is in the templates section) on Tuesday? This may be best as in the ROC letter, you refer to the LBA, so it would make sense if this is sent first? Does this help? x

I hadn't received an offer, jsut a standard letter saying they were looking into it, so have amended my LBA to include the following paragraph: Thank you for your letter dated 5 October 2006 and its enclosed leaflet. In my previous letter, I advised I would give you 14 days to reply to me accepting, unconditionally, my request in principle and letting me know a date by which I will receive payment. This has not happened. Don't know if you could send the ROS letter as janquinny advised and maybe adjsut your LBA slightly? As they haven't met with your original request?

Hi Ocharged!! We are at exactly the same stage! I am also sending my LBA on the 9th!! (Nice we are keeping the halifax busy!!) In a way I hope they don't pay up, then I get my 8% interest, which is about £150!! hee hee!! (I'm claiming £1800 since June 04) I will keep an eye on your thread and see how you are doing. We are nearly there now! I have had a look at the MCOL site and it looks quite straight forward, and I have read up lots on what to include on the claim form by reading other people's posts. Bet i'll still have lots of questions when it comes to actually doing it!! The very best of luck (not that you will need it!) and let us know how you get on!!!

Here is my LBA to the Halifax. I have had to amend it slightly as they HAVE sent me a letter (albeit a standard one with a useless leaflet!) AND I have incurred more bank charges since my original Request for Repayment of Charges was sent. Does this look ok? Thank you for your letter dated 5 October 2006 and its enclosed leaflet. In my previous letter, I advised I would give you 14 days to reply to me accepting, unconditionally, my request in principle and letting me know a date by which I will receive payment. This has not happened. I now understand that the regime of 'fees' which you have been applying to my account in relation to direct debit refusals, exceeding overdraft limits and so forth are unlawful at Common Law, Statute and recent Consumer regulations. I would draw your attention to the terms of the contract which you agreed to at the time that I opened my account. It is an implied term of that contract that you would conduct yourselves lawfully and in a manner which complies with UK law. I am frankly shocked that you have operated my account in this way as I had always reposed confidence in your integrity and expertise as my fiduciary. I calculate that you have now taken £1836.00 in charges. I am enclosing an amended copy of the schedule of the charges which I am claiming until the 30 September 2006. I have already sent you my schedule of charges until 18 September 2006 in my original letter of the 24 September. I require repayment in full of this money. If you do not comply fully within 14 days then I shall begin a claim against you for the full amount plus interest plus my costs and without further notice.

Will do then, thanks again! x

Great! Thanks Jonni2bad! Another £97 added to my claim then!! I take it that even though I have had a letter saying they are looking into it, I still keep to my original 14 day deadline before I send my LBA, or should I extend the deadline? Sorry for all the q's but really don't want to get it wrong when the end is hopefully in sight!!