Why let your bank keep your money? Calculating your charges claim

[Bookworm]

The OFT has already pronounced on a "fair rate" of £12.

Sorry, but no they haven't, and I am a bit surprised you should say that, maybe you should re-read the OFT statement of april 06? ;-) In fact, the OFT very clearly stated that their "threshold intervention" of £12 did NOT mean that a charge of £12 was fair and they very specifically said that ONLY a court could decided what constituted a fair charge, therefore:

The only thing is that it may not be possible to claim back CC charges if they were actually levied at the OFT capped rate of £12.

 

I think that you will only be able to recover those charges which were lvied at a higher rate.

is factually very incorrect and as far as I can see, as long as people know to claim it all back, the CC pay it all back. Oh sure, they TRY to say that they don't have to repay it all but if people stand firm, they do get the totality of it back. Speaking for myself, I have had both higher and £12 charges back from Barclaycard and Capital1 (+ interest levied on those charges + s.69, of course), and I am not aware of CC companies going to court to argue the toss (apart from Citi maybe, but let's face it, they always were awkward beggars ).

 

 

The courts have been happy to stay CC charges claims as well.

To be fair, generally mainly if the claim is placed through MCOL, then again, I don't doubt some judges can't see the difference or can't be bothered to.

 

So my summary would be at odds to yours and I'd encourage people to keep on claiming the totality of their CC charges, whether be the £12 or more and stand firm and when the CC companies try to negotiate for the difference, confront them with the April '06 OFT statement as quoted above. And don't forget to add the interest on those charges, of course.

[Bookworm]

Would the refunded charges be credited to the account at the time of judgement or would they be credited to the account at the time of deduction. Would the charges be refunded or amended?.

Assuming I understood your question correctly (always debatable as soon as maths are involved ), the answer is, wait for it: That depends.

 

For example, in my B/card claim, as my account had been fully paid up and closed by the time I sued them, I added the interest up to the time I had paid the account in full, as anything above that would be in my mind unjustified.

 

For account still live and with an o/draft still ongoing, then my calculations for the interest paid on charges would be updated daily up to the date of settlement.

 

I understand - I think - what you are saying about interest on positive balance: If you get enough charges that they would put you in an o/d situation, then if you hadn't had the charges, you wouldn't have been o/drawn and therefore with an account in credit, you should have been earning interest instead of paying it, is that what you mean? And yes, I can see the logic in that, but I think the calculations would be nigh on impossible to establish. Bear in mind that as it is, our calculations can never be that precise, as for example, someone like me would have paid off their o/d (inc charges + interest) in full many a time in the life of the account, then would have crept back in it, accumulated more charges and therefore more interest, then consolidated, etc, etc... the o/d limit would also have varied through the years, and of course the authrosied rates and unauthorised rates also varied, and the banks changed what they would pay/not pay/charge/not charge, add or remove buffer zones or vary the amounts, the permutations are endless and make it impossible for us to come up with anything much more than a back of the enveloppe calculation, and no doubt one that favours the bankers yet again.

 

My argument always has been when they argued the numbers (especially the interest): "Yes, I know it's unlikely to be the exact figure, but if you want to dispute it, then saying "that's not right" is not going to be enough to sway the judge, so either show your own figures and how you calculated them or shut up and pay up". They have always paid up. In the case of B/card, they caved in literally as we were walking into the court itself, they were still trying to haggle me down whilst waiting to be called in.

 

For those who don't realise how much the interest can add up, the rough figures for my b/card were £367 in charges, but the interest levied on those charges up to closure of the account were worked out at £188 on top, and when added the 8% stat interest (which ran to the date of settlement), the total came to £756. Think about it before you decide not to try because it's too difficult to work out. I did that in my early days and now realise that I let the sods get away with hundreds £££ of MY money.

[Bookworm]

oops, sorry, just remembered, they have 40 days to comply so you won't meet the hearing on 22 June, but think you should put in a claim for as far back as you can in the meantime.....

I'm sorry, I haven't been on as much as usual lately, so I may have missed something, but why the big rush to get a claim in before the HOL hearing? :-?

 

This hearing is just one more step in the long drawn-out process of the judicial system and whichever way it goes (and it is fairly unlikely to change directions drastically, let's face it), it is still going to be a long way from ending this test case, so I am a bit confused right now. Unless I have missed some momentous news, of course, in which case can someone point me to that? Thanks.

 

(s) Intrigued of Croydon. ;-)

[Bookworm]

Not just that, but then there'll still be the second part of the test case, to decide what constitutes a fair term in this instance.

 

Anyone who thinks that this is will be over by July 09 is in for a very big shock, I think.

[Bookworm]

Yep, quite agree with you there. Mine's only a small one, but hey, it all helps!

[Bookworm]

You need to send a subject access request. If you go to the information comissioners office website (google it) there is details on there of what to pu and plenty of templates on this site.

NO need to go to the ICO, there's a template SAR right here on CAG. ;-)

 

State in the letter that you want all statements since opening the account, they may try to wriggle out of giving you all of the them so be persistent.

Not statements, all DATA relating to your account.

 

It might be worth calling them to find the right address to send the SAR to as the banks tend to have a seperate department handling these applications.

Each bank forum has a sticky detailing who the data controller is for their company.

[Bookworm]

"I'm sorry, I haven't been on as much as usual lately, so I may have missed something, but why the big rush to get a claim in before the HOL hearing"

 

I think someone said on a previous thread that you may not get the 8% interest after 22nd June on your court claim.

 

That's essentially the argument.

Ok, now I am really confused. Why not? :-? The 8% is a statutory thing, set in s.69 of the County Court Act 1984, how could it not be claimable? :-?

 

Don't get me wrong, I am all in favour of people lodging in their claim asap for whatever reason, but I can't see the 8% interest being an issue here.

[Bookworm]

Incidentally though I can tell you from the horses mouth that they want s. 69 looked at given where interest rates are at the mo. So my overall point is that they'll look very carefully at anything that will skew things their way.

 

Cheers. EIE.

Whoever "they" are, they should think carefully... Because if you start looking at rehauling set court rates, then let's not forget that the LIP rate has been set at £9.25 / hour since the 70's and is even more badly out of date than the s.69. Any idea what that would work as at today's rates?