Hardship - a few "Specific" questions!

[Gallen]

Hi everyone,

 

I have been hearing and looking in to the "Financial Hardship" exemption from the bank's current stance of a hold on all claims (I have had a claim for bank charges on hold with LTSB for around 18 months, possibly more).

 

I have a couple of questions re: Financial Hardship

- please advise if you can?

 

OK,

 

To meet the Hardship criteria (as I understand it), it says that you must have had at least £500 worth of charges in the last 12 months.

 

Question 1:

- in my main LTSB account, I am expecting that I will fulfill this requirement at the end of this month, after this months charges come out.

 

- Had I known about this during February 2009, I would have easily exceeded the £500 min charges rule and then some, as I would have been able to go back to February 2008 but as a fail safe, is there any way to take this into consideration - especially as the bank never informed me of the financial hardship possibility? (no suprise but there you go!)

 

Question 2:

Does this £500 qualifier apply PER BANK ACCOUNT / PER BANK, or is it £500 "in general":?

 

For example if I were to tally up charges from my main account and then add charges from our Joint Account (which is with another bank) would this be allowed? This callaborative total would easily be greater than £500.

 

(....Basically, does the £500 qualifier need to be formed from charges per account or per bank, or is it (hopefully) in general?

 

Question 3:

 

From the Money Saving Experts page...

Are there regular requests for increased borrowing or repeated rescheduling of debts?

 

Translation: Are you living off credit, struggling to repay it and regularly needing to increase credit limits? Or do you have a special debt payment plan in place with lenders as you can’t afford repayments at the usual rate?

I think I may meet this criteria - it is commonplace for me to require to increase my overdraft regularly to avoid more charges, or to cover charges coming out. I have increased up to £2800 now, and it's way beyond a joke. Most months I need to add another £50 just to avoid charges from charges.

 

Finally, my partner and myself bought a property during December 2007. I paid off all my debts and overdraft with the equity from my old property and we took out an interest only mortgage with the plan of "overpaying" in order to pay off the loan.

 

- Because of the charges we have had, I have never managed to over pay my minimum payment at any time. With the property market as it is and prices having dropped, I am worried that we have not been able to action overpayments that we initially intended (and possibly have negative equity).

 

Please advise - it really is appreciated.

 

Thanks.

[yourbank]

LloydsTSB are the worst for Financial Hardship of all banks it would appear.

 

"2.

In making an assessment of financial difficulty the firm will take into account:

a.

evidence of changes in lifestyle, including loss of employment; disability; serious illness; imprisonment; relationship breakdown; death of a partner; starting a lower paid job; parental/carer leave; and starting full-time education;

b.

evidence of the following events:

i.

items repeatedly being returned unpaid due to lack of available funds;

ii.

failing to make loan repayments or other commitments;

iii.

discontinuation of regular credits;

iv.

notification of some form of insolvency or court proceedings;

v.

regular requests for increased borrowing or repeated rescheduling of debts;

vi.

making frequent cash withdrawals on a credit card at a non-promotional rate of interest; and

vii.

repeatedly exceeding a credit card or overdraft limit without agreement (and, in this regard, where a complainant has incurred over £500 in unauthorised overdraft charges in the previous 12 months, that is to be treated as indicative of financial difficulty)."

 

The above is the criteria but in general banks are looking at priority debts arrears(council tax, rent/mortgage, utilities) or arrears where court action is threatened against you.