It is indeed - wee person, wee mortgage! Luckiily if I tried to by my place now it would apparently cost just under 3 times what I paid for it, so I don't envy my new neighbours! LBA deadline for Smile with me today. Nothing in my account, no secure messgae response other than the one telling me that they had an 8 week timetable. Oh well, they have until tomorrow at 5pm (because I'm feeling generous) and thereafter I'm applying to the Courts.

Sorry, having a blonde moment - why congratulations?

My LBA deadline with them is tomorrow - nothing as yet from them other than their, "We'll respond in 8 weeks". Aye right.

CCA Letters sent recorded to both RBoS Visa and Halifax Visa yesterday/ let's see what comes out of those, but I've got the funny feeling I didn't sign anything to that effect. Certainly it's been totally useless when I've needed it!

I don't know what the problem is with Smile - even this month they refused to allow my mortgage direct debit even though there was a balance of £3K in the account and the payment due was for £700! No smile here!

Ach they only went and responded! Anyhow, the sum to be claimed is about £550, but I'm also going to tackle them on the PPI issue too.

Yes, also in Scotland! To be honest, I'm quite happy to use the English system to get it all back at once. I used Newcastle County Court for both Nationwide and the Halifax claims and found it fairly straightforward. Would be happy to follow that route again!

I've tallied all these up and they came to nearly £2K!!! Will certainly be sending a CCA as I'm absolutely disgusted that I put so much money into them, and when I needed it, they did nothing to help me.

Hi - new on here after being successful with bank reclaims. After regaining 6 years worth of Halifax visa statements, I notice that the PPI cover on it has at times been up to £80 or £90 per month at it's worst. This from a starting point of £11 or £12. After tallying these up, it looks as if these come to £1500 or so over 6 years. In those 6 years, I have twice tried to claim unsuccessfully, most recently when the balance of the card was over £11k (I know, but now down to £670!) they turned down my application for cover because I hadn't been in continuous employment for over 6 months (at least I recall that as being the reason). Is there anything I can do about these exorbitant costs? Even if unable to claim for the full period, is it possible that I would be able to claim for the periods that I was ineligible for cover due to my employment situation? Would be grateful for any advice as I was a dimwit with reclaiming charges when I started, but have successfully regained my wealth with some help and guidance from CAG, and I'm hoping that the same may occur with the equally exorbitant PPI I've been paying.

Tell them to shove that - the most they can charge is £10! I'm also not happy with my Halifax credit card as looking back over statements, I was at times paying £80 or more per month for a policy which, you guessed it, never paid out when I was unemployed! I was in permanent employment when I took out the PPI, but within a few years was made redundant or on short-term work which rendered the policy effectively useless. I haven't added up the total PPI I've paid in the past 5 years to them, but it does appear to be thousands.

And a secure message in response to my LBA sent by recorded delivery and secure message? We have received your letter about the charges on your account. You should have received a letter from us letting you know that we are looking in this for you. However, we work to timescales set by the Financial Services Authority. We are allowed up to 4 weeks to reply to your initial complaint. However, law allows us a maximum of 8 weeks to respond to your complaint. If we need anymore time after the initial 4 weeks we will let you know either by secure message or written letter. I think not!

Great mention for CAG in the Evening News on this today (can't find a link though). The Clydesdale seem keen to drag this one out, yet other settle very quickly Each to their own I suppose, but on a point of principle, I'll not go to them for my new account for this, Harry!

Preparing prelim letter to RBoS for £432 worth of charges in the past 6 years (I must have managed this account way better than some of the others recently which is astonishing giving that they don't allow you to pay by Giro in their branches and that the payment date has always fell about 20 days after pay day!).

Still nothing in response to my DPA other than the holding letter - if they're true to form, someone else is probably reading them right now thinking they belong to them! Now preparing a 'didn't comply with the DPA' letter.

LBA has now been sent claiming back just under a thousand pounds - let's see what happens over the coming fortnight!

Fantastic news - hopefully your debts didn't keep you awake as mine did!

Bookworm, exactly my concerns. The reclaims are easy to deal with, it's the after effects when accounts are closed, CRA information is incorrectly recorded, etc, etc which have been the bigger problem for me.

Absolutely - having been in financial difficulty (unemployment, death in the family, etc, etc) it drives me insane seeing two people with a family who have steady, secure jobs put themselves in a needless position. I suppose it's only when you've experienced real financial worries that you know just how affecting it can be, and the impact it will have on every waking hour, every sleepless hour, your credit score for years, your ability to put food on the table................... ......but some people just do not want to listen

I know that some reclaims are much more involved than others - the point is, you can get back thousands of pounds of your OWN MONEY with relatively little effort. The process is so much easier than I could ever have anticipated, and I've been blue in the face telling everyone at work about this! Kind of agree with your last comment - if you don't want to spend a few hours over the course of the 6-8 weeks reclaim timetable getting the cash back, then is it deserved?!

The thing that astounds me is the willingness of people I work with to think, "Ok, yeah, we'll give you some of our money to get our money back". NO NO NO NO NO:mad: (Where's a bang-head-off-brick-wall smiley when you need it?!) I've told one person on 5 or 6 occasions where she can get the info she needs to get her money back (which her husband has calculated as being £3K just in the past year so imagine what 6 years could be!), but for the past few months now she'll say, "What's that address again, yeah, I lost it again........I know I know................" And then I heard her arranging a secured loan for a new £10K car! So, rather than knuckle down and log onto this page and speak to all you lovely people, she would rather secure a loan against her family home for a car I really, really despair. Rant over! I'm on a day off!

A few people have work have received cold calls from these companies offerig to get their charges back. In one instance, I got £2K back after ONE LETTER and ONE PHONECALL as a follow up. Total time spent? An hour and a half. I've printed off the CAG details and left them around various places in the office so that people know where they can go for advice. We are all very very busy people, but the statements could easily be tallied up in an hour or so (speaking from experience) and from there it's just a case of sticking to the CAG hymnsheet and you will get the money back. If you really can't spare three or four hours over the next month, then maybe it is worthwhile getting someone else to do it for you, but I'm like everyone else on here - couldn't recommend the use of an ambulance chaser.

Halifax did a similar thing to me when I was out of work - they used cash from a savings account (which had a cheque my mum had given me for food as I had sweet FA to live off in it) and they used that to pay my visa that month, even though I had a PPI claim in So, no food for 3 or 4 days, while I waited for my benefits to be paid in.

I hate self service with a passion. Bought some flowers in there on a Saturday morning to take to a friend. Anyhoo, massive 'saturday morning' queues so went to self service, after all, it was only a bunch of flowers. Wish I hadn't bothered as it took forever and a barney with the old wifey who stands about with the large keychain with a load of cards hanging from it. Firstly, it didn't recognise the item, then it did the weight on the belt thingy that others have experienced, then it insisted I get a member of staff, so the wee wifey storms over and I have to start again.............after 2 or 3 goes of this, I say, "Look, I've not got time, I'll just get them elsewhere". Wee wifey says, "It's gone through now, you have to pay". "No I don't - I'm leaving as this has been a complete waste of time". I'll get security". EH? What for? Getting fed up of faffing about with a poxy self-service machine for 20 mins just to buy a bunch of flowers which I'm not even taking out the shop. My killer comment to wee grumpy wifey? "Grow up" Even if she was about 60.

Oh, a holding letter arrived from them saying that statements would arrive by seperate cover. Here's hoping. I've paid off the majority of this card, but have left the portion that I believe I'm due and hope to use this to close the card off. What a joy that will be - I lived off it when I was unemployed so it has my mortgage and everything on it for months so it was a BIG card!

It's absolutely about control. I used to pay everything by DD when I got paid monthly (which was over the past 9 years) however in the past 10 months I've been in a role where I get paid every 4 weeks, my pay is on various days throughout the month and it's so much easier paying by cheque, paypoint, cash, etc, as I know exactly what is being paid and when. I've paid a few things up front like my TV licence and contents insurance, and also pay at the PO for my electricity and Council Tax which, although it doesn't seem a lot, these are things I've previously had bother keeping track of coming out my account. Woo hoo! I'm in control now!