Hi, Hopefully you can give advise on my next step regards my complaint. I am trying to be fair with my bank and only asking for my original payment of £120 to be reimbursed, I am not asking for payment for the time and effort I have put in to writing these letters and sending these recorded delivery, the 8% interest, and the added stress this has caused me as a pensioner and full time carer for my son who has severe mental health issues and trying to make sure he isn't sectioned again by making sure he is taking his medication. I really could do without all this on top. I feel if I don't get a satisfactory response this time I feel I will make a claim for the stress caused etc, the whole process has been shambolic from start to finish. Here is the time frame at the moment from start to finish and where I am currently at with my complaint :- 26/11/2014 - Item bought for £120 as a Christmas present for my grandson 5/01/2015 Item broken after just over a week, Emailed seller with no joy, so sent item off for repair, told it was unrepairable by a reputable company. 20/02/2015 (86 days after purchase) - sent letter recorded delivery to my bank asking to inititate a chargeback. 28/02/2015 (94 days after purchase) - Received letter from Fife office saying they needed proof that I had returned item, or at least tried all avenues to try and return item. 09/03/2015 (103 days after purchase) - After giving seller time to supply said information to return item and receiving no reply, I sent another letter recorded delivery with all information of trying to return item, I also sent photographic evidence of the damage to the item I got from the reputable company I sent the item to be repaired at. This letter was signed for at the Halifax office in Fife on the 10/03/2015. I received a text asking to ring the Fife office on the 16/03/2015 (110 days after purchase) I rang and they were unsure of why I was ringing, I explained the situation and the reference number of my complaint, They checked the system and were adamant that the letter I sent recorded delivery had never arrived I gave the tracking number and name of the person who signed for it. at the Fife office. They said it wasn't on the system so couldn't have been received, Not wanting to argue I said can I email all the information which I did on the 16/03/2015 (110 days after purchase) 07/04/2015 (132 days after purchase) I received a letter from head of debit card disputes saying I was now out of the time limits that Visa International set for disputing a debit card payment so therefore they would not be able to claim a chargeback for me and that is the end of the matter as far as they are concerned. I have sent a letter today giving them 14 days to rectify the situation, I keep all receipts and copies of information I send including tracking numbers which I have sent to her, which shows I was well inside the 120 day Visa International limit. I am unsure of my next step? Do I go to customer services, or go to the financial ombudsman? I am pretty certain Halifax debit card disputes will refuse to reimburse me as they can't now initiate a chargeback as it is over 120 days which Visa set, I just don't feel it is fair me being punished for shoddy administration practices which has happened in this case. They had the information well within the 120 day limit. Thanks, Rosemary

Hi All, I called several times HSBC (UK) and asked them from where could I obtain file request for doing direct debit so debited funds arrive to HSBC account. I was asking where could I get this file so I could know which info (columns?) must exist, which info is mandatory and which recommended or even not needed/required. I also wanted to ask where could I upload/transfer such file to the bank since HSBC clearly has nothing like this in online banking? Not even ONE single representative was able to help. Everyone told me they never heard about such activity (see title of the post), e.g. ISO20022 or excel files. Could someone tell me step by step instructions about this please?

Hi I have been obtaining help and assistance from MacMillan Cancer Support due to a recent diagnosis and they have suggested I make 4 DDI claims against some transactions on my Lloyds account dating back to 2010. The amounts and dates differ than from what was agreed but due to my illness I didnt check them. I lodged the claim with Lloyds after being told by one of the customer service assistants that I should have kept a closer eye on my account...to which I replied Oh sorry I was busy having chemotherapy and my mind was elsewhere. So after a week I still havent heard anything so have called them and they have told me that they have written to the companies in question to see if they can get the money back from them first before they give it back to me? Im really confused - I thought the bank would indemnify my loss? Does anyone have any advice or tips of which I can do or say next please to push this matter through a bit quicker? Many thanks for your help

In October last year I apparently over stayed my welcome in what I thought was a freecarpark, that's what it says on the way in. In the post came the parking charge notice which I have ignored, then I received what I thought was the red reminder about a month late, but on closer inspection it was from another company about another pcn. Well with that one I had no initial notification. Now I have had the next letters demanding payment or further action. Please can someone help me with what to do. I find some of the threads confusing so I thought I should start my own.

Hello, I was wondering if anyone could possibly help me with an issue I'm having with Harlands. I joined the xcercise4less Gym last year in around June 2014, ending my membership around August 2014 (not sure on exact dates at the moment however I'm sure I can retrieve these. After getting into financial difficulties I cancelled my DD with xcercise4less in around August meaning they could not collect my monthly membership fee. I fully accept that in hindsight, this was not the right thing to do and I should have given the 30 days notice as per the contract. After cancelling the DD i received a letter from Harlands advising that I owed them a £25 administration fee for the DD cancellation plus the monthly membership fee for xcercise4less which I think was around £19.99. Following some online research I noticed a lot of complaints about Harlands and their so called administration fees. I did eventually contact Harlands and paid the £19.99 and advised I would pay the fee the following week. I also sent a letter to my gym confirming my membership cancellation, that I'd paid the outstanding £19.99 to Harlands and that I should no longer be liable for any payments to xcercise4less. The following week I attempted to call Harlands on three occasions to make the payment. All times I was kept on hold for a ridiculous amount of time (I have screenshots of the call attempts I made). After the last call I emailed them to advise that I would no longer be wasting my money to call them and they could contact me to collect the fee. I also advised that I would only be paying £25 and no added charges as I had attempted to call them. I received 2 automated replies from them stating something along the lines of call the following number to speak with us (despite me clearly advising them I wouldn't be ringing again). I have since received another letter from them advising that I owe them £44.99 (19.99 for my apparent missed installation for December plus 25 administration fees). They've advised that in order to cancel my membership I need to pay £64.98 (the above plus a further 19.99 to cancel) which is absolutely ridiculous. Can they do this? I'm starting to get quite worried and anxious about it all! Any help would be much appreciated. Regards, Sarah.

I there any time limit on invoking the direct debit guarantee? Merry Xmas Nos

While I was withdrawing money from ATM, Suddenly two persons came from my back side and one of them cancelled my transaction and I asked why you are cancelling my transaction. He replied that This ATM is not working and the other guy also said the same. I thought ATM is not working and my card has been stuck in the machine. Immediately I have called bank and got to know from customer care representative that some dispute transactions worth 2500£ (300£ refunded by bank as they withdrawn this amount at ATM) were made on my card and I have cancelled my card. I went to Local police station and suggested to report in actionafraud.police.uk and suggested to wait till the bank response. I am really worrying whether the bank will refund my money for these disputed transactions? OR do I need to go for Police/Court?

Hi, I recently took out EE Home broadband, and elected to pay the line rental up front for the year, so £132 was taken by direct debit on 15th Oct. However, the swines also took a second £132 yesterday. I phoned them and they agreed it was an error on their part, but said all they could do was to put a £132 credit on my account (or else a refund would take over a month!), but they told me to call Barclays and claim it back under the direct debit guarantee (Indemnity claim or something they called it). I call Barclays yesterday evening, and they agreed to do it, but said it would take a minimum of 3 working days, plus if they need more details they will post me a questionnaire to complete and post back to them? Now the wording of the direct debit guarantee states: "If an error is made in the payment of your Direct Debit, by the organisation or your bank or building society, you are entitled to a full and immediate refund of the amount paid from your bank or building society". how immediate does it mean? Does Barclays count 3+ working days as immediate? I now have next to nothing in my account, and have things that need paying. Who is responsible for overdraft charges if I need to dip into this whilst this is being rectified? Thanks in advance.

To cut a long story short, I lost my job through no fault of my own - company went bust. I've now got a new job which I started on Monday. Having no money except for my three tiny pensions (one was cut in half today, reducing it from £75 per month to a measly £38 without any warning whatsoever but that's another story for another thread - and yes, I've already complained), I had no option last week but to take the money I had set aside to cover a direct debit to use it for fuel for the car as I have to travel a distance now to get to work (and we had to eat too). The direct debit was due out on the 26th September, which was a Sunday. I withdrew the money on the Thursday 23rd September. Strangely, this transaction has showed up like this: 26 Sept HANCO25SEP The date above does not tie in with when I withdrew the money. Now, RBS are charging me for an unauthorised overdraft at a rate of £6 per day. I will get my first week's salary on the 10th October which means they're going to help themselves to at least £60 of that. I can't afford to lose that kind of money. I spoke with a very unhelpful young man who said they can recall the DD - or I have to pay the bank charges and since they already refunded me bank charges (their fault not mine) of £6 a couple of months back they can't (or won't) refund any more. I don't mind paying the charge of £6 for the missed DD but object to paying £6 per day on unauthorised overdraft charges. There was no money in the account so they should not have paid the DD. Advice please on how I can deal with this would be greatly appreciated. As for having an authorised overdraft, I did ask for a small one a few years ago and got turned down.

hi Really looking for some advice. I have an ongoing issue with british gas, this has been going on for over four months now and i dont know where to go from here. * I changed my account with them and needed to re-set the Direct Debit. Existing Direct Debit stopped.... * They then continued to try and take the money from the old account direct debit, despite new details and a new Direct Debit being set up. * Numerous phone calls resulted in two further new Direct Debits being set up and STILL they continued to try to take the money from the original Direct Debit instruction.... * All this time, I am losing track of what is owed to them, despite many attempts to pay my bills via direct debit. * We are losing our discounts because they 'Can't' take the money and i am spending countless hours on the phone, time when i am supposed to be at work trying to address this issue. * I even took a full day off work and had to cancel a family day out in order to wait in for a call from them and they never called * I have emailed them the details of the Direct Debit instruction many times and they've never replied * Now we have been contacted by a debt collector 'Buchanan, Clark & Wells' who are chasing the money we have been trying to pay them... . After speaking with B,C & W they informed us that they contacted British gas who told them that they weren't supposed to contact us as they were aware of our complaints, but that the staff member responsible for addressing this is away on 'annual leave' with no return date..... We are at the end of our tether and do not know what to do from this point on..... Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Lindsay

hi guys, I need some help please. I recently returned from a family holiday to the Gambia, where on our first day we attended the TC Rep's Morning Reception Talk to give us an overview of the resort etc. We booked 2 excursions which totalled approximately £297 but they took £3100'ish which took me overdrawn and of course i've been hit with costs and several returned DD's which compounds my problem. The main problem was the fact I didn't have an overdraft facility, so firstly i've hit the bank for an explaination why they allowed £3k to be taken when a facility wasn't in place and secondly to TC to complain and recoup the money plus costs. As this happened on day 1, it didn't actually leave my account until day 8, in which time i'd spoken to several departments in my bank only to be landed with a foreign muppet who didn't have any concept of my situation. This has ruined our holiday as i've not been able to access any funds for the second half of the holiday until my wife rang her bank to ensure she could use her Debit Card abroad without the fraud dept stepping in etc. We had to eat at the hotel for a couple of evening meals whilst my wife sorted her bank out a nd the telephone calls on mobiles and landlines from the room are clearly being added to my complaint. The TC Rep kept telling me that the bank were going to return the funds etc but as yet it still hasn't been returned and i'm not building my hopes up that this will happen to be honest. Hopefully you guys can advise how best to complete my complaint to both the Bank and TC. Thanks in advance.

Hi all, New here, first post. I live in Greece and have a Barclays a/c in the UK where my Fire Service pension is paid in. I use the ATM in Greece and online banking for everyday transactions. My Debit Card runs out in August and although I have asked if my card will be renewed all I have been told is....it is in the post. Is there a proper telephone number to contact in the UK to confirm this or do I have to spend hours and money being moved from piller to post to get an answer. I ask this because many ex-pats here in Greece are being refused renewal from various Banks (Santander in particular) because they think we are money laundering and a bad risk. Thanks in advance

Hello, I've been a member of my gym for a couple of months now and originally had some problems with admins fees after a missed payment. I cancelled my direct debit with Harlands and spoke to the gym manager who managed to sort of all the admin fees and allowed me to pay for my missed membership at the club, however, I now need to reinstate my direct debit and the manager said I should call them. After reading through many threads on this site it seems quite clear that I should not call them, I'm now asking is there anyway I could do this by email? I wouldn't really know what to say or how to do so any help would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks.

Good evening everyone, I recently decided I need to deal with the Lowell Group as they started to pester me too much and started doing unlawful actions?? Let me explain. I had a contract with O2 that started in 2007 and somewhere about April - May 2008 I received a letter from them to pay off my 720£ contract since I was unable to repay due to being unemployed. I left UK to try my luck elsewhere and when I came back to UK again in 2012 I started receiving letters from Lowell again and it continues until today. I had a 120 pounds debt with Lloyds Tsb which was on my credit file and it was sold to Lowell as well, decided I will start paying it off since that wasn't such a large sum so I've setup a direct debit and am currently paying it off through Lowell, now what happened just recently is that Lowell Group has setup a second direct debit WITHOUT any acknowledgment from me!! I cancelled the direct debit immediately since I didn't agree to anything like this. I was ignoring all the letter from them for my O2 contract. What they are saying is "If you don't call us to resolve the matter... We will cancel the repayment arrangement that we have agreed with you (I haven't agreed to anything!!) and pass your details to our legal division (Hamptons Legal). I started reading after this and found out that a direct debit has to be agreed by both parties, how could they setup a direct debit without my consent? Could someone please tell me what would be the best action to undertake? 1. I am not sure if the debt is statue barred What steps should I take next?? Any help would be greatly appreciated Thank you

Hi all. We moved into our new house last Friday and we had zero furniture as we were buying new. I saw a great suite deal on www.galaxystores.co.uk (£747 for a matching 3 seater sofa, 2 seater sofa and foot rest) ordered it Monday evening. It was meant to be 1-2 day free delivery but heard nothing tried to log into my account on their site to try and track my order but couldnt, clicked for a password reminder - it never came emailed Galaxy who said it would arrive Friday before 5pm. Friday 5pm came and went and tried to contact Galaxy Stores only to find they have NO telephone number had to email them, they seemed to want to stall me for time by asking me if Id received a text from the courier - I hadnt, I asked twice for some kind of tracking number which they wouldnt/couldnt give me and was just told they would sort it out and arrange another delivery day. I looked up on Galaxy Stores (yes, I should have done this first but their site looked really good) and have only seen bad reviews for them, how they dont send orders and then dont refund. I am in desperate need for a sofa and cant really wait as we are all sat on the floor and have been for a week. My question is, under these circumstances, can I get a chargeback now rather than waiting a certain amount of time so I can buy a sofa from somewhere else and tell the people at Galaxy Stores to kindly cancel the order that may never come anyway? Ive checked my bank account and the money was taken out on the 24th. Im with Barclays and used a VISA Debit card on Galaxy Stores site using Sagepay. ETA: Correction, the money has been taken out of my account.

https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/lLAFhTjsQHw%26sns=em This video was sent to me by a friend. I have googled the issue and it would appear that it has been reported by the media last year. Apparently in our fast moving society.. swipe and go appears to be the way Banks are moving forward. However, an American journalist has discovered this could cause many problems. He went to an airport with a consultant who was able to simply point something at their pocket/handbag and download all their credit/debit card details and then clone them onto his hotel key card. He was then able to purchase items by swiping his Hotel key card !!

Several years ago I got a CCJ for a debt. This was before I found out about this forum and enforceable agreements, CCAs etc and I've no doubt if I had gone down the CCA route there wouldn't be an enforceable agreement! That's another matter though but as I couldn't afford to pay the CCJ off in full I agreed to pay a small monthly payment and set up a direct debit with the Lewis Group. This direct debit has been running for several years however I checked my online banking last week and noticed a new direct debit set up payable to Robinson Way (The Lewis Group one is still there also). I'd not had any dealings with this company before and certainly never set up a direct debit with them so I cancelled it immediately. I called Robinson Way and established it was for the same CCJ I was paying the Lewis Group for. They said I would have been notified by the Lewis Group of the transfer. I have not received any communication from the Lewis Group or Robinson Way concerning any transfer of ownership. In any case though am I correct to be annoyed that Robinson Way have set up a direct debit from my bank account without my knowledge or consent? Is there also a breach of the data protection act? Robinson Way must've been passed my bank account details from the Lewis Group which I did not give them permission to do, isn't this a bit improper? For any new direct debit wouldn't I have to sign a new direct debit form/agreement? I certainly haven't done that with Robinson Way!

Help! My partner and I took out fully comp insurance with 1st central and were paying by DD. He had an accident about a month into the policy and the car was deemed a write off. We went through the process, it all seemed very simple and straight forward....however....yesterday I got a phone call saying we owe them £789 and that we won't be getting the final payment for the car, that they will be using it to write off some of the debt we owe them, leaving us to owing them £464!! This is the whole premium for the year car policy! They emailed me over the DD instruction when I took out the policy telling me to go on to the customer portal and tick the box agreeing to the DD which I did, as far as I was aware I was agreeing to a DD instruction, well apparently they actually loan the money to 1st Central Insurance from 1st Central Finance so you are taking out a loan to pay the car insurance, not paying your car insurance by monthly payments! Having read through their 40 page policy wording document I have finally got to PAGE 30! which has cancelation and claiming information and under 10.7 it says you could be liable for the full amount of the policy if you have an accident, surely this can't be right?! We had intended to keep paying the policy and when we got a new car, inform them and update the policy, as this is usually the norm, however they have informed me we would still owe them £464 and we would still not receive the £350 for the car! Please help! What can I do?! Not only are we not getting any money to help us purchase a new car but also now owe the insurance company money! Can they do this?! I believed I was signing a DD, not a loan agreement! At no point was I informed it was a LOAN! And the emailed informing me of the DD has no mention of it being a loan! I didn't have to read the DD agreement when I clicked agree on the portal and naively thought that the agreement was the same as the information they had sent me in the email!

This is really a strange one, I have a WDA account and so does my OH - their account is fine and is paying over and above each month to reduce the balance and no in default. My account is a different story and in default. Last month OH's bank rang to say that WDA had tried to take out over £200 on their debit card and obviously was refused. A couple of days later they paid on their account using their debit card. What I have found out is that WDA are trying to take money from their bank account for my account. Are they really allowed to do this. I can again state that their account is not in default whatsoever and is paying the interest every month together with a little bit of the capital to bring the balance down. Would people say this is fraud and are they allowed to take someone else's money to pay for my account.

I have just checked my online banking to find out a company called HFO services ltd have set up a direct debit on my account. Anyone know who they are as I have never heard of them or no what this is for! Thanks

A few months ago I subscribed to a website which required giving my card details. I gave them the card number, expiry date, CVV as requested, and thought nothing of it. That card then expired at the end of January, and being honest, I totally forgot about telling anyone the new card number. However, when I checked my bank statement the company were still taking money using the debit card details I had given them previously. The card number is the same, but the expiry date has altered, as has the CVV number. So how can they possibly take payments off a card that no longer exists because its out of date. Its not the fact they've taken the money, because tbh I was quite happy to carry on with the subscription anyway, its just the strange point that a company can charge a debit card on account details that no longer even exist. Is this normal ?

I've had my finance with Banque PSA for 3 years and changed my direct debit date shortly after starting the agreement to the 19th to coincide with my payday. I have now had to find new employment and my pay date has changed to 5th of every month starting from February. I received my last wage 19/12/2013 and they received payment then for December. I contacted them last week when I received my new pay date to see if they could change the direct debit - I was advised it can only be changed once so no it can't be done for 5th of the month. I will now miss Januarys payment on 19th but they refuse to agree a payment plan before the payment fails and I have to wait for there to be a missed payment to be hounded and harassed by phonecalls regarding this. I've advised I will pay my full payment on 5th Feb presumably for Feb and pay £80 additional to cover Januarys for the next 3 months. Are they allowed to do refuse to change my direct debit date? If so I will receive letters, default notices and phonecalls every month going forward as I can't pay on the 19th. Any advice what to do? It's not that I can't afford to pay or am refusing to pay I just can't pay 19th of the month anymore

i have been paying a direct debit to my electricity supplier based on their average usage estimates even though they periodically call or send someone to takes readings.. i have just moved out of the address and when notifying isupply energy they have responded in the mail with a £441 pound bill. ive never seen, had access to or been told of any outstanding monies owed and this seems a bit underhand that they suddenly drop this big bill on me dating back 10 months. just wondering how the world has allowed them to carry on with such behavior ? cheers all : ) ..just wanted to say that the service i bought was their 12 month fixed price electricity tariff. just wondering also if someone might tell me if the meaning of the word "fixed" has changed in the last 10 months?

Hello, I have recently had 2 failed direct debit charges from 2 different organisations. (not a bank which authorises the payment but the company who collect the payment) One has charged £25 and the other £20. I can't see how they incur charges from their bank as they state and if so I don't believe the charges reflects the true cost to them for a failed direct debit.
 My question is: 1, Is this lawful? 2, Is there a maximum they can charge? Thanks.

Last year I rented out a room to make some extra cash to a student. Long story short he did a runner owning rent and left the room in a tip. Wrote to him at his parents address asking for outstanding amount to be paid or I would go to small claims court to pursue had no response. He failed to turn up at court in Nov&Feb court found in my favour. I tracked him down via his new employer a few weeks ago and engaged the sheriff officers to deliver the decree to his address which gives him 14 days to respond which he didn't. So last week I applied via the sheriff officers an arrestment of earnings order against him. Suddenly now I have his attention and had a call from the CAB stating that the 3rd party doesn't owe anything I explained the situation to the CAB who have then said well sounds like he's had his chances and will now need to engage a solicitor. I've been told by the sheriff officer he cant stop the arrestment of earning order and I know there is no direct right of appeal against the court findings. But I think he can try to get the hearing re-called and would this prevent me from getting the money owed until it was resolved