Does anyone know if my letter from the post above is any good?

I'm no expert but my initial claim was similar to yours and on the 28th day they defended it stating 'Our client is embarrased by the lack of particulars in your claim...' I would imagine that you will receive a similar letter and you will have to submit a much more detailed claim (my second attempt was 4 pages of A4 paper!). You can find a copy on one of my threads (search for 'Wissa'). Don't worry, I've messed up several times and each one has cost me a further 28 days without my money but you always get a second chance. Keep asking for advice on this site and keep reading as much as you can from other peoples threads. If you don't make mistakes you will get your money quicker!!! Good luck

I failed on the MCOL (my own fault!) and had to pay more money to re-submit my claim correctly. On the 28th day they entered a defence and I had to submit an allocation questionnnaire (AQ). After a further 28 days I received an offer for half my money which I accepted as part payment ONLY and I'm now waiting for the rest. I started my claim in June and it's STILL going on so be patient but also BE SMART and READ as much as you can at every stage! All the help and info you need is on this site and it's best to check EVERY SINGLE CORRESPONDANCE here first before sending anything off. Good luck!

Hi all, This is a new thread as I don't know how to continue on my existing thread. At the end of August I received a letter from Cobbetts offering me £2100 of my £4000 claim. It gave me 7 days to respond but I was away on holiday and the time had expired when I returned to find the letter. I have today received the letter again, giving me a further 7 days. The difficulty I have is that this claim has been going on since June and the 28 days that I initially gave them has long since passed. I have found the letter template to decline the offer but the ending isn't appropriate as I can't say 'My letter before action sent previously indicates that you have until 23/07/06 to respond before Court action commences. You are reminded that there will be no extension to this timescale' so what date is reasonable to put on the end? This is what I have prepared, is it acceptable? Response to settlement offer. Dear Sir, Thank you for your letter dated 05/10/06. I respectfully decline your offer of settlement and request, once again, that you return to me all charges imposed on this account, totalling £4000.00 I will accept the sum offered only as part settlement and on the clear understanding that I will pursue recovery of the remainder, with a County Court claim if necessary. You have until 20/10/06 to respond before Court action commences. You are reminded that there will be no extension to this timescale. I trust this clarifies my position.

Hi everyone! Well, I feel like I'm waiting for my cheque to arrive any day now but so far nothing has turned up. I've had an offer for half of my money which I've refused and I have a letter from Exeter court saying the case has been stayed until 21st Sept (Tomorrow). I've just rung the court to find out what that means and they say the case is on hold indefinately and nothing will happen until either party starts the ball rolling again. Therefore, if I keep waiting nothing will happen!? Does anyone know how to apply pressure to get my money? Any help greatly appreciated.

I was away on holiday and missed the 7 day deadline to accept the offer of half my money back. I know not to take it anyway but what should I do now? It's too late to accept or decline it so should I just sit and wait? The court date is 21st Sept and I'm confident I won't be the first case to make it to court, especially as the OFT are now investigating the way banks operate their 'fees'.

Anyone know whether I need to contact Cobbetts to decline their 'un' generous offer? Should I just sit and wait?

They originally defended the claim from moneyclaim because I cocked it up. I have now re-submitted a 4 page claim that covers every angle and filled in an allocation questionaire for the courts. We have a court date of 21st Sept so I'm expecting them to fold before then.

Hi. You will get your money but it's not easy and you need to READ and READ and READ the info available on here. I made some stupid mistakes which cost me more money and months of extra work. In my case they 'laughed' at my initial letter, didn't care about the letter before action and then entered a defence on day 28 on the grounds that I'd not submitted the claim correctly. At this stage I started taking it much more seriously and checked on this website every step of the way to make sure I was not making any more mistakes. I have just been offered half of my money back as 'goodwill!' but it won't be long now before they are forced to give me the lot. They certainly know what they are doing and I strongly advise you to make sure that you do too!!!! Don't expect them to say "ok, it's a fair cop, here's your cash". One other point, be careful if you're claiming over £5k as this is too large an amount to be dealt with as a small claim. I'd ask for more advice on that if I were you. Good luck!

Hello all. I'm now in what I hope are the final stages of claiming my £3900 back. I have returned from holiday to a letter from Cobbetts offering £2100 as full and final settlement. Obviously I'm not interested in having half of what they owe me....I want it all! Do I have to respond to their letter? The offer is valid for 7 days and this had already passed before I even saw it. Do I just sit tight and wait for the full amount? If anyone knows I would be most grateful. Many thanks.

Thanks for your support, it really does spur you on when people in the same boat are achieving their aim. Did you actually go into Exeter Crown Court, and if so which department do i need?

The next 2 questions are:- Level of judge Parties to be served The level of judge I have no idea about, but I would pressume that Parties to be served are Nat West?

I have dowloaded the N244 form, thanks to the help of Northampton County Courts, I don't understand it and would appreciate any help in filling it in. The first section reads :- You should provide this information for listing the application 1. How do you wish to have your application dealt with a)at a hearing? b)at a telephone conference? c) without a hearing? There are tick box's by the side of each question. My instinct is to tick at a hearing?

Thank you, I am hanging on the telephone as we speak to Exeter courts who unfortunatley are not answering their phone. thread #29 from haydn gives me a very comprehensive letter format to use, is this any good in place of the N244?

Hi All. I cocked up my claim and I am now having to re-submit everything all over again. Does anyone know if I can add the most recent charges that have been levied on my account to the existing (defended) claim or do I have to get my money back for this claim first and then start over for the latest set of unlawful charges? Any advice is much appreciated, thanks.

Last week I started a thread because I have massively cocked up my MCOL claim and Nat West have therefore been able to enter a defence. The letter from their solicitors (Cobbetts) says the defence is due to the particulars of claim being "incoherent and do not disclose any legally recognisable claim". Luckily, they have allowed me 14 days to rectify this problem and I have already received some great help (and well deserved abuse!) on my previous thread. I have rang Exeter court (where the case is set to be heard) and requested an N422 form but this has not arrived and it's been a week. Cobbetts sent me an Allocation Questionnaire which it looks to me like it does the same job as an N422 (ammend the particulars of claim). I have taken a few days off work to sort this mess out and would be very grateful for any help that you guys can offer. Who do I send the AQ to? Is it Cobbetts or the court or Natwest? Someone said I should write to Cobbetts and attach an ammended claim. Is MCOL any more use or do they think they've done their bit? Please help, damsel in distress!

Thanks to everyone who's posted help. I'm VERY sorry to have cocked up so badly and I apologise to all the people who I've upset by doing so. Hindsight is a wonderful thing and I won't be doing anything else without first posting a thread for advice. I've got to go to work now but I'll be very glad of any advice that anyone can give and I will respond as soon as I can. Thanks again guys!

I have rang MCOL this morning and they said that although we applied for default at 9am yesterday, it doen't get looked at until 10 am the next day, by which time the defence had arrived, so I agree that MCOL is almost useless!

We have spent hours reading other peoples stories but they all seem to be at the 'asking for statements' or LBA stages. This site is so huge that I've just tried looking in the FAQ's to see what I've missed and it seems to offer nothing of any relevance (although I'm sure if I spend a few hours reading I might find what I'm looking for!) I've just rang the court to request an N244 form to amend the particulars of claim. He didn't mention a cost attached to it. There is a limit to the amount of characters that you can put in the online particulars of claim box so how have people managed to send 2 pages of A4 in? I have just found this on another thread, is it any use? I contend that: The charges debited to my bank account are punitive in nature; are not a genuine pre-estimate of cost incurred due to any breaches of contract; exceed any alleged actual loss to the Defendant and are not intended to represent or related to any alleged actual loss, but instead unduly enrich the Defendant which exercises the contractual term in respect of such charges with a view to profit. The contractual provision that permits the Defendant to levy such charges is unenforceable by virtue of the Unfair Contract Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations (1999), the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 and the common law. Accordingly I claim: The return of the amounts debited in respect of charges in the sum of £XXX; Court costs; and Interest under section 69 County Courts Act 1984 at the rate of 8% a year from xxx (date)to xxx (date) of £xxxx and also interest at the same rate up to the date of judgment or earlier payment at a daily rate of xxp (amount in pence)

You're right of course, but it all seemed so cut and dry to me: they owe us money and all you have to do is write and tell them. I hope if nothing else we serve as a bad example and save other people from making the mistake. DO YOUR RESEARCH FIRST!!!

The letter from HMCS states: The defendant has filed a defence. A copy of which is enclosed. An allocation questionnaire is also enclosed which contains guidance notes on how to complete it. You must complete the enclosed allocation questionnaire on or before the 22 August 2006 and return it, where the claim is over £1,500, the court fee of £100.00 to Exeter County Court. ************************************************************** Following on from my first post, the defence from Natwest also states: The defendant invites the claimant to remedy the above. In the event that the claimant fails to do so within 14 days of the service of the defence then the Defendant will apply to the court for an order striking out the particulars of claim The defendant reserves the right to plead further to the particulars of claim once and if the claimant properly particularises the same. In the meantime, it is denied that the claimant is entitled to the relief claimed or any relief whether as pleaded or at all. What should we do now? Do we have to pay the HMCS fee of £120 again?

I'm embarrassed myself just reading it but I thought the online court would re-word it in legal jargon (otherwise their £120 fee went towards the cost of printing off an A4 page and sticking it in a postage paid envelope which I may reclaim as unfair also!!) Anyway, this is what we wrote in the particulars of claim: I am reclaiming all unfair charges levied against my account over the last 6 years. The charges mainly relate to exceeding overdraft limits and amount to £3137.50 in this time frame. The claimant claims interest under section 69 of the county courts act 1984 at the rate of 8% a year from 30/11/2000 to 14/06/2006 of £714.14 and also interest at the same rate up to the date of judgement or earlier payment at a daily rate. Not very impressive I know!

It's all been going so well until this morning we received a letter stating that they intend to defend the claim at Exeter court. The defence states: The Defendant is embarrassed by the lack of particularity pleaded in the particulars of claim to the extent that the particulars of claim fail to disclose reasonable grounds for bringing a claim against the defendant. In particular: 2.1 The particulars of claim set out no facts indicating what the claim is about, are incoherent and do not disclose any legally recognisable claim against the defendant. Have we blown our chances by not getting the claim written up in legal jargon? I thought the £120 that was paid to the online court was for them to check the claim and ammend the legal jargon as necessary (most Nat West customers aren't lawyers and thanks to their disgraceful charges can't afford a lawyer either!) The defence letter asks for another £100 court fees. On the up side, today is day 30 since the claim was deemed as being served and we actually requested judgement by default YESTERDAY (day 29) as they had not defended in time. Anyone know if we're in or out of luck?

Hi Mariana, Talk about out of the frying pan and into the fire! Over the past 14 years I have banked with just about every high street bank (both business and personal), Natwest have by far been the worst ones!! My girlfriend is currently persuing £3900 from them, most of which is £39 charges for less than £10 over her limit and, like you, bringing the account back into her limit on the same day as it went over. Furthermore, she has been paying £10 a month for the 'privaledge' of having this wonderful account that pays less than 1% interest for credit and charges over 19% for debit! I have just convinced her to open an Alliance and Leicester account which offers 0% overdraft, 10% on savings, 4% on credit, NO account fee AND they pay you £25 if you are recommended by a friend. You can also earn yourself £25 for every person you recommend and there's no limit to it. A&L are apparently quite bad at issuing charges too but we all know what to do about that now, don't we!!