Hi All, Just a little advice please. I had a works pension that was frozen some 8 years before I got married. My wife and I are going trough divorce and she seems interested in some of this pension. Question is as the pension was paid into and frozen before we married is she entitled to some of it? I am retired and disabled and claiming pension credit + enhanced PIP and Enhanced Mobility. the pension she is looking to have part of pays £42.27/Month She is 58 and due to retire at 67. She has a work p\lace pension and she earns around 1,500/month her new partner earns about the same. wondering also if I am entitled to Spousal award, not that I want to claim any of it, just use it as a lever to get her off my back. Thanks in anticipation Ken

Hi, I'm hoping someone here will be able to help. I'm at my wits end. On Wednesday last week the police turned up at my house and arrested me on suspicion of fraud. (A complaint made by my sister and about which I was interviewed on Saturday - I've done nothing wrong and hopefully that is what the result will be) On Thursday morning my Housing Benefit was paid into my account and I was able to use my account. By Thursday afternoon the money had vanished. I couldn't get hold of my bank immediately so I transferred my savings (only £100) into the account - assuming it was just an error - so I could pay for the food shopping. That money has never arrived either. I contacted the bank Thursday PM and was told the money was there, it was just 'not transactable' and they couldn't tell me why. Friday was bank holiday. I called again Saturday and was told the same thing. Then two more closed days. I called again this morning and was told the same thing and my child benefit that should have gone in this morning has now also not arrived. (well it has, I just can't access it) Strangely the balance that was already on the account was untouched and I was able to use that. (only about £50 which has now gone) I'm a single mum and it's the school holidays. I haven't been able to do any food shopping, take my son out, or anything and I'm now down to my last £8 with all my bills to pay. I have no idea what to do! No one will tell me anything. Has this come from the police? Is this something the bank have done by themselves? I have almost completely run out of food now and I have no idea what I'm going to do to feed my son. Can anyone shed any light?

I have a personal account with the coop bank, which I've been using to trade Bitcoins on localbitcoins.com. I recently had a trade of £1250, for about 7BTC. The buyer paid into my coop bank account, & the escrow was released for the bitcoins. A few days later I received an email from the coop's fraud department, saying the buyer's bank had claimed that the buyer hadn't received their Bitcoins, & they wanted the payment reversed. The coop froze my account (which had a balance of £250) & requested "proof of entitlement". I obtained screen-shots of the trade, proving the bitcoin was released, & attached them to an email. this occurred over a week ago, & I'd heard nothing back, so Yesterday I phoned the fraud dept. for an update. I had a conversation with a very impolite woman, who said "the evidence you've provided isn't sufficient, we require a signed receipt". I explained to her that the transaction is conducted online, with no physical meeting, so there is no signed receipt. She said "your account will be closed Tommorow if we don't receive adequate proof" - ? I did question the fact that she hasn't forwarded my proof to the other parties' bank, or seemingly done anything with it. She had no tangible answer for this. My issue now is, I want my £250.00 back. This bank is shocking, can anybody pls let me know the best way forward - surely I can demand the return of my funds?

Hi everyone I'm having a battle with my meat company and am not getting anywhere. They are refusing to accept responsibility and won't refund me for the cost of the ruined meat and are holding on to my credit balance when I cancelled the account one month ago and whilst I am convinced I am in the right I don't know that I am. What happened was that during the summer the courier left my meat order with neighbours that I am not very friendly with and on that occasion they signed for the meat and promptly went out for the rest of the day. After that I asked the meat company to please ensure my meat was never left with those particular neighbours. In addition the company ask for a safe place to be designated. I have a wonderfully safe place in my rear garden shed, which is completely hidden from the street, and the company claim to honour your chosen 'safe place' but all of this year FedEx have only once bothered to go to my garden shed and have persisted in leaving it with those neighbours. I started only booking in a delivery when I knew I could wait at home all day but last month my work was postponed by a week and I was left with no choice than to not be at home. On this day FedEx delivered my predominantly fish and chicken order to those blacklisted neighbours and then FedEx did not leave me a delivery note to tell me that is where it was. I emailed the company at 7pm to say I had not had the expected delivery and the next morning I had to call the office again as they had not responded. They then told me that the meat had been left with those blacklisted neighbours and as I was working an hour away from home I could not go to the neighbours until the evening when I got home - which was 7pm again. I went to the neighbours house and they had kept my meat in the living room for some 30 hours and the room was like a furnace it was so hot. All the meat had defrosted. £91 worth. The neighbours knew it was meat but clearly didn't feel any responsibility for it even though they had signed for it. Ultimately I hold the meat company responsible because they knew I did not want my meat being left at that house. They are saying that they can't be responsible for their courier, they say that on their website. But I think its unlawful because I provided a safe place with excellent instructions (and they also say on their website that they will leave it at any safe place of my choosing and so being out need never be a problem!) which they ignored. I specifically requested that my meat never be left with these particular neighbours because of previous problems and they told me on the phone that they understood this but have done nothing to stop it happening again. I have told them I was not left a note and FedEx is saying they did! I have been sending them regular emails over the month and last week I wrote to them to tell them that if it was not resolved, and me fully refunded by 1 January 2016 they I would complain to the Consumer Ombudsman. Even if they don't want to refund me the meat, surely they should have returned the £90 that I was in credit by in my account before I closed it? Please can anyone advise if the Ombudsman is the way to go and if I should feel entitled to a full refund? Thank you

I am not sure if this is the correct section for this?? I have taken this out of a letter sent to the Finance Mail. N.L. wrote: I have power of attorney over my mother’s financial affairs. This lady accompanied her mother to her local bank, where they signed papers so that on her death (they were told by the bank) there would not be any problem accessing her account. They also went to another bank and were told exactly the same thing. (all they would have to do is produce the power of attorney on her death) her mother has since died. However on approaching the banks (obviously she needed money for funeral expenses etc;) she was told that the bank had frozen the account and taken back the debit card she held. The answer she was given was that the bank was right to freeze the account—and wrong to advise her that she could use her mother’s account after her death. They stated that a straightforward power of attorney ceases to have any effect when the person who dies. At this point, it is the executors who have control of the deceased’s assets. My question is this is there a different’s between a power of attorney and a lasting power of attorney? and would a lasting power of attorney have allowed this lady to continue drawing on this account?

About three weeks ago i opened an account at barclays with my NEW business Manager as it is a brand new business account (business has been trading for 5 year) After meeting with business manager and opening a business account we proceeded to trade as normal at my business. On the 29th of May i paid in some cheques from my clients, which was about 100K, i informed barclays about this even before i put the cheques in and i also told barclays what the funds would be for, Business manager told me that it was ok to put them ALL in as i had informed barclays before i even did so. On wednesday the 4th of June i went into the branch to see manager again about our online banking facilities and to add our staffs sort codes and account numbers to the account so that we could pay their wages. When i arrived there to do this i found that the account was at a minus and that the funds had been frozen. To my disbelief i asked Bank manager what was going on and she told me that barclays where doing checks on these payments. It is now Thursday the 12 of June. I have been unable to pay my staff from last month, i have been unable to pay my rent, I have been unable to pay my bills. Not only this but i have been unable to pay my tax bill to HMRC.I have also not been able to pay my business rates at the office, i have been unable to pay telephone bills at the office, I have no staff in my office, my business which i have built over 5 years is at a complete stand still. Every time i call them they tell me its opertional Difficulties! Ive raise complaints to head office... this is terrible. and you wouldnt believe how i am feeling....How long do we have to wait for these checks? Do they not realize that this is affecting all of my staffs lives and mine!!!!!! please dont tell me to go legal, fighting a bank legally is a long process, i just need my business back!!!

Hi there I'm currently going through a repossession process with FP & seeking advice on here via another forum As an aside, when I contacted FP for a redemption figure the amount had jumped loads higher than had previously been quoted on letters etc & after querying it I was advised that it is because they had decided , without advising me, to freeze the interest nearly 3 years ago & now there is about £7000 to add back onto the redemption figure! This is the first I've heard about it & certainly had no idea the figures being quoted on other correspondence where this much out of synch with the real balance. Is there anything I can do about this? I've already raised a formal complaint about it but so far the answers have been somewhat vague Also, can FP still proceed with repossession (under a suspended PO) whilst a complaint is outstanding? many thanks in advance for your help

I'm currently scratching my head over an issue with NatWest. For a number of reasons, my company was dissolved for not filing accounts just before Xmas. I was expecting this eventually, but it still took me a little by surprise as all the advisory correspondence seemed to get stuck in the Xmas post and didn't arrive until New Year. This meant the company accounts with NatWest were frozen - the first I knew was when I couldn't log in online or use the debit card. I understand this is the process, and even though there was a balance of a few hundred quid in there, I don't really have any grounds for complaint on that score. However, a week or so after the account was frozen, two of my former clients mistakenly sent their rent payments by standing order to the old company, instead of to the management company that had taken over. NatWest were happy to take these payments of course, and I've got no way of recovering the money - more to the point, nor do the clients, who are now in rent arrears. NatWest say the account is "frozen" but not closed - ie money can flow in but not out, and when they finally enact the process of closing the account, the balance is forwarded to the Treasury Solicitor. I'm struggling to understand how the account can be in this kind of limbo - either it's open or it's closed, surely? The Treasury Solicitor publishes (rather vague) guidelines on what banks should do in this situation - http://www.bonavacantia.gov.uk/output/BVC16-Banks-and-other-Financial-Institutions-about-Cash-Balances-belonging-to-dissolved-companies.aspx My reading of this is the account should be closed immediately the bank learns of the dissolution of the company, instead of this kind-of half-closed status. I don't understand the legal basis on which they can accept payments to a non-existent company that's already been dissolved. Does anyone have any insight / experience of this situation? I don't even want the money myself, I just want to get the payments reversed to help a couple of small businesses now stuffed on their rent bills. I can - and probably will - apply for ex gratia payment from the Treasury Solicitor, but this will take months. And it doesn't change the fact that NatWest seem to be acting improperly here.

Hi all, I'm posting this for a mate.His Debit Card was either lost or stolen a couple of weeks ago. The loss was reported to Halifax within 12 hours after making sure the card hadn't actually been left at home.Halifax then agreed to send out a new card.One week later, no replacement card had arrived, and after contacting Halifax, he was told that his account has been frozen as some some purchases were made in the area in which the card was reported as last seen. (East London is a pretty big area)They sent out Statements for my mate to verify transactions against (which still have not arrived over a week later), and he is now starting to suffer financially as a result of not being able to access his funds for over 2 weeks now. (His account is comfortably in credit)The Phone Drones on their UnHelpDesk are unsympathetic and really unhelpful.Advice please!!

Hi I got an email from [email protected] explaining that the following: "Old" or "Frozen" Pension Plan? . Attractive alternative to borrowing Minimum of £2,000 paid to you You must have an "old" or "frozen" pension Minimum £16k cumulative pension value required Free & No obligation Absolutely no credit check They then ask you to fill in a comprehensive form with your personal details and the pensions you have frozen....... How can they get you immediate cash?

Hello In first, sorry for my bad english, im french ! I would like to talk about my problem, i explain the situation step by step : - In may i opened a basic account with halifax, a guy asked me my agreement and my french passport, i gave them ! - He asked me what i do in england, i told him im a professionnal gambler in sports, so i wouldnt like any overdraft, credit, checkbook, and just a simple card for withdraw my benefits ; thats a fifty-fifty relation ! - Few minutes later, my account has been open, and that was ok. - Two month later and many withdrawals from sportsbooks after, i receive a letter at the end of july. - In this letter, halifax ask me to give one proof among them : passeport, wage slip, or proof of credit. - Naturally, i gave once again my passport, i still dont understand ... finally i understand thats a pitiful trap for see if they can found any problem for closure ... - I must clarify that im french guy, with french id, and french passport, not a romanian, or extradited policy of course, no legal problem in england, all of my bills has been paid. - I made essentially withdrawal by wire transfer from my sportsbooks, deposit by cash ( biggest of 3000 £ ), and two deposit by check ; one is a big check of 10000 £ another of 700 £ - I have around 40000 £ in this account, thats the reason why im afraid ... I sold my car and bought another with the same account, and i use this account for my car's insurance, internet, gym, and water The problem is i cant access at my account, i cant buy what i want, and i cant paid anything, that include the most important : water ... Do you know how many time i need to wait for unfreeze my account please ? any guys ( or girls ) have this problem ? Thanks in advance !

Any advice on this would be very much appreciated. Barclays have frozen my personal and business accounts and are demanding repayment in full. I'm overdrawn £1,765 on my personal account. The overdraft limit is £1,600, with a £150 buffer. The business is no longer in operation. That account has no overdraft limit but somehow I've arrived at £1,700 overdrawn in that as well. I have no other bank account and my credit rating is already dreadful as a result of other, ongoing debt problems. I doubt I'd be able to get another account, unless there's a very willing bank out there somewhere. I'm currently only working in a voluntary capacity. I've had mental health problems and I really don't feel as though I could hold a job down (much as I'm sure the benefits people would disagree). I don't claim any benefits at all. I've been told that I'd be unlikely to get any as my husband is American and I haven't paid national insurance for a few years. We have no income and I'm living off my parents. I really can't see a way out of this. Thanks in advance for any advice you might be able to give.