Help! Barclays have closed my account

[Fantasticfix]

Hi there, hope you can all help me..

 

I have found out today that Barclays have closed my bank accounts with them. I have/had 2 bank accounts with them for the last 8 years or so, one of which was a student account and another that was my current account that my salary was paid into. The student account had an overdraft of £2000 on it that was at its maximum but was within the overdraft limit. Every month or so, Barclays automatically transferred money from my current account to the student account (without my permission but it is in the T&Cs that they can do it) and this kept the account within its limits. I have not had any requests from Barclays to pay the account off or to make payments to reduce the amount.

 

On Saturday, I went to use my ATM card and it was retained by the ATM. I was told that I would need to return today to retrieve the card, which I have done. After it transpired that the card had been destroyed as apparently it was reported 'lost or stolen' by myself - which I had not - I then called the card services number and have been told that the card was retained as the account has been cancelled.

 

I have not been told of this - it would appear that although they were informed of my new address they sent a letter to my old address (they confirmed the address it was sent to and not the updated and new address) so the phone call that I placed this morning was the first I had heard of it. I asked them why and they said that the student account was not 'active' and therefore they have chosen to cancel the account and have sent it to 'recovery' who will contact me. As the student account has been cancelled, they have also cancelled the current account, on which there have not been any problems. Both accounts have been closed on the 27 September. The advisor on the phone said that they 'thought' I would be able to access my money in the account up to the 27 October, but they couldn't guarantee that.

 

I have been in and out of the bank recently and have even spoken to an advisor in there only a couple of weeks ago about a new card, and at no point has anyone spoken to me about the accounts being cancelled.

 

Am I going to be able to open another bank account with another bank? If not, how on earth will I get paid by my employer? Is there anything I can do about the accounts with Barclays? If I don't get to my money in time, how can I get it back? Will they keep it?

 

Thanks in advance for your help, so glad that I found this website as hopefully your advice can stop the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

 

Thanks again

[slick132]

Hi Fantastic and welcome to CAG.

 

You really need to establish whether your a/c(s) have been closed or not. It's my understanding that they must give you 30 days notice of this.

 

Unless they tell you it's a mistake and all is well, you need to get a new a/c set up urgently, with another bank, for your next salary credit.

 

Otherwise, your salary will be paid into your a/c and B's will keep it to cover the Student o/d, leaving you with nothing for the month.

 

Looking at the bigger picture, have you been charged penalties on either of the a/c's. If so, you can reclaim these by taking court action to recover them.

 

You'll need your bank statements for the last 6 years to check for charges and, if you don't have them, you can send off for them using an SAR. Read the Reclaiming Charges guide in Link No1 in my signature below about this process.

 

Priority must, however, be to find out exactly whether you a/c's have been formally terminated with 30 days written notice, or not.

[MrShed]

Reading between the lines here, this sounds like an "innocent" administrative screw up to me.

 

Even the banks give you written notice to try and bring an account up to date, and also I have never heard of a bank cancelling a non-defaulted account just because it was under the same name as a defaulted account(assuming worst case, and that they believed the account to be defaulted).

 

As slick says, first thing is to call them first thing tomorrow, and speak to a manager regarding this to find out what is going on. Dont waste too much time on this - they should be able to find out easily if it was a mistake or not. No joy, proceed directly to a formal complaint(which will, unfortunately, take up to eight weeks). During this process, immediately set up a "parachute account" so that you at least have a bank account.

 

Were the funds in the current account less or more than the debt in the student account?

[saintly_1]

Have you received no notification of the accounts closures? As stated they must give you 30days notice.

 

If they have closed both accounts without giving you 30 days notice then you MUST put in a complaint to the FOS.

[slick132]

If they have closed both accounts without giving you 30 days notice then you MUST put in a complaint to the FOS.

And tell the bank you will be making a formal complaint if this is not an error.

[Fantasticfix]

Hi All

 

Thanks so much for your help.

 

I went into the bank yesterday to ask why/what and to get statements that I needed to open a new bank account. After some unbelievably rude treatment - including one man who said 'I am on a break for another 15 minutes, you will have to wait' (!!) - the chap on the information desk went through my query. I absolutely hate discussing anything financial with these 'personal banker receptionist' in the middle of the bank and without any privacy but unfortunately had no choice as there were no personal bankers available.

 

He checked my account and confirmed that indeed, the account which has the student overdraft of £2k has been closed. He said that letters have been sent out to me but have been sent to my old address (I had updated this with a very disinterested PB in Central London weeks ago and he had not done it) and have been into the bank regularly in the meantime as I had snapped my bank card and had been withdrawing over the counter, and also I had reordered a new card with a very helpful PB in Hammersmith (I had moved jobs in between) and not once had anyone spoken to me about the student account being closed or them needing to talk to me about it. He has said that they will need to send me the letters again but it was my understanding that they can print them out in the bank - maybe I am wrong? Anyway, the upshot is that I have not known that they were wishing to close the account until this debacle.

 

However, he then stated that I had been misinformed by the debit card services advisor who had told me that they needed to close both accounts as it is in their T&Cs that if they need to close one account, they will close them all. He told me that my account was still active and that there aren't any notes or letters attached to the account to indicate that it would need to be closed on the 27th, however, he could not give me any guarantee that the account wouldn't be closed but that I would need to check on the 27th and if it had been, they would reopen it for me. Bizarre to say the least. They have now reordered my Connect Visa Debit Card and I have opened a new account with Natwest.

 

I have made a complaint to Barclays about the fact that they have not tried to call me about my account, have sent out letters to an incorrect address which is only on the account due to their incompetency, that I was told my card had been reported 'lost and stolen' when in fact there was no need to retain it in the first place, have been misinformed about my account closures and the stress caused with regards to that - they even informed me that should the account have been closed it would have been illegal to do so?!

 

If you have any advice as to where to go from here, then that would be great but to those that replied earlier, thank you very much, you put my mind at rest!

 

Kx

[Fantasticfix]

Oh and I should have said that yes, I do have charges on the account and have had it for 8 years. Can you also claim charges back on an account that is closed?

[slick132]

Hi Fantastic,

 

This shows how important it is to confirm anything in writing. The change of address should have been done by letter and it will be impossible to prove you notified them via a London PBanker.

 

So, it sounds like they "THINK" your a/c will stay open but check later this month to see

 

You can reclaim bank charges whether the a/c is open or closed. You can go back 6 years - read the Reclaiming Guide at Link No1 in my signature below.

[Mr lex]

Hi Fantastic,

 

As Slick says you can reclaim your charges from a closed account. The sooner you start the better.

 

They will probably try to tell you you can't claim because the case's are 'stayed' It is important that you ignore this and carry, only the courts can put a 'stay' on your claim.

Although the banks have a ongoing test case with OFT there are a number of reasons why you should start claim at court now.

 

Any older charges (coming up to 6 years) could be lost if you wait for the OFT case to end. Start your claim now and those charges are protected.

 

When the stays are finally lifted, you will be one of the first in the queue to get paid.

 

While the banks are protected by the stays, we the consumer, have no such protection and charges continue to mount up.

For some people this may mean going into default. If it is clear that the default was made in respect of charges and that it was lodged after a charges claim was begun then these users have a really excellent chance of having it removed.

 

Hope this helps

 

Lex