Up, up and away! Against the RBoS

[Wardle32]

Hi all,

 

Well, I'm over the first hurdle- I've just got the gargantuan pile of statements back from the RBoS (within a week!) following the Standard letter from the archives.

 

A couple of queries so far:

 

1) I got a letter a couple of days before the statements acknowledging receipt etc but they must be well aware of the work being done here as they put in a couple of paragraphs about 'charges being part of our agreement with you' to try and stop me before I've begun! Not a chance.

 

2) although I've got the statements themselves there isn't a copy of any notes that were put on the system in relation to these. Has everyone else had these notes supplied? I have had several 'run-ins' with the bank over the years and I think there may be some notes on there that are subjective rather than objective and, therefore, will probably help my case.

 

3) I know that there's a section in the FAQ about what you can and can't claim back, so that's where I'm heading next. The only thing I'm really un-sure of is the charges I get against my overdraft each month- there are 2 things I'm charged for- 'Interest' and 'Charges'- as these both vary month to month I presume the Interest is un-claimable but the charges are dependant on how often I've exceeded the overdraft limit etc and therefore claimable- is this correct?

 

That's about it for now- it's down to a prolonged game of 'spot the charge' whilst going through my trees-worth of statements.

 

I'll keep you informed on how I get along

Thanks

[icklepeach]

Hello Wardle.

 

I am asking for all charges, plus any interest, as my overdraft should be interest free, so interest is only charged when I am unauthorised borrowing, which is predominantly because of borrowing. we sent the SAR last Thursday, so I am hoping that it will be there when I get home. although there's no one there to accept it, and I don't think it will go through the letter box!!

Good luck

 

iPeach

[seawall]

Regarding the notes, this might be of help. Something that I said to Credit Management at the RBoS was taken to mean that I wanted access to everything that they had stored about me. As a result I have ended up with loads of notes about phone conversations and the like. This may have been helped by them apparently losing the SAR letter, so not being sure exactly what I wanted. But it seems, if you ask for it, you can get it.

[Wardle32]

Right- I've been through the statemtnts (although they've missed off the last years worth of one acc- which is where I've received the most charges!) so I'll have to chase them for that- they've also sent nearly 200 pages of statement twice. Not sure what happened there either.

 

So far, however, it's looking like it'll be in excess of £4G- which will be nice. I'm currently going between joy at the amount I'm going to get back and anger that I've given them so much over the last 6 years.

 

Anyway- I'm still not 100% sure that everything I'm claiming for is legit. I'm a 'Royalties Premiere' customer- does this mean I can't claim back my monthly charges? The one thing that makes me think I can is that they do seem to vary month to month (from £5 up to £40). Does anyone have any experience of claiming these back? Is there a £5 minimum that covers the cost of the Royalites Premiere?

 

Also, I've come across some really large charges- regularly £60 for 'Referral Charges' does anyone know what these relate to?

 

Looking forward to sending this off- I feel no guilt with doing this whatsoever as they have been terrible to deal with over- it's been purre laziness that I haven't changed bank sooner!

 

Thanks

[icklepeach]

Hi Wardle,

 

I don't think you can claim back the royalties charges, as they are considered payment for additional benefits, such as free travel insurance or the ilk, sort of like a membership fee!

 

I am currently trying to get to the bottom of the referral fees, as they appear several times in my statements, but with no reference to why they are there. I think they are an additional maintenance charge for a "bad month" although they don't seem to fit any particular pattern! If I can find out any more I'll pm you!

 

Good luck

iPeach

 

xx

[Wardle32]

Thanks iPeach,

 

I've been looking at these carefully over the weekend and they've been quite clever- they've only applied the one charge each month but they've included the fee for being a 'Royalties' customer and any 'bad behaviour' charges in the one- so I'm having to go through and subtract the 'Fee' from each charge for each month. Bit of a pain but ait's better than just saying that it's not claimable.

 

As for the Referral Charges- there is no way that that can be a justifiable cost- so they're definitely getting claimed!

 

Anyone got any experience of climing part of a charge back from a bank???

[Wardle32]

Just spoken to Joyce Tudor (whose name was on the original acknowledgment letter for the request for statements) and she has said that 'Referral Charges' could be for not paying DD's, going overdrawn etc- in other words it's RBoS's terminology for extra bank charges and are therefore claimable.

 

I also asked about the notes to accompany the charges (as they were missing) and she said I'd need to conact a manager in Cust Relations- would I like a name and address? Of course I would- guess who's it was: good ol' Tommy MaClean!

 

I'll let you know what happens next...

[icklepeach]

so just so we are all clear,

 

Occasionally, and whenever they feel like it, RBoS has been levying additional charges to accounts the month following unpaid items.

 

These are in addition to the fine levied at the time and are a second charge on a single item.

 

????!!! :o

 

Niiiiiiiiiice.

 

and they wonder why we are annoyed!!

[anna-maria]

Hi there,

just to let you know a refferal fee is charged when the bank pays something for you when you have insuffuicient items in your account. When you go overdrawn by £25 or more this is when rbs will charge you £30 for each direct debit payed when you are overdrawn along with a lovely maintenance charge of £28. I know because they do this on a regular basis to me!!!!!! Good luck

[Wardle32]

That's terrible!

 

It's like robbing someone and then charging them 'Thief Tax'.

 

Like I said in an earlier post- I'm torn between chuffed with the amount I'm re-claiming and angry at the amount that I've paid them!

 

The amount I'm claiming is roughly the same as my overdraft with them. So if I didn't have that, I wouldn't have got the charges, so I wouldn't have got into debt, but then I wouldn't be able to claim it back...

 

Help, I've got myself in a paradox!:o

[Wardle32]

Found this link about the varying charges from RBoS - basicaly- they do merge the Royalties Charge (un-claimable) with excess use charges (claimable).

 

This is kind of what I was building up to do- but T4FF has done it for me- thanks- and useful to anyone else considering the same:

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/royal-bank-scotland-bank/42749-bit-help-you-rbos.html

[Wardle32]

Just done as advised and gone through all my copy statements checking the top for the name of acc (eg'Royalties PRemiere; Royalties Gold') but for one of my statements it just says 'Royalties Account' for every statement. Does anyone recognise this as a specific acc and know what the agreed monthly charge (if any) applies.

 

thanks

[icklepeach]

the graduate royalties charge is £6 a month, but they often bundle this with a maintenance charge, so it comes up as £34.

[Wardle32]

Long time, no write.

 

It took ages for me to work out what the charges I should re-claim were. I ended up adding acouple of columns to the spreadsheet showing what the monthly charges for my various Royalties accounts were and subtracting this. The final figures is about £3700- I was going to not bother trying to split out the payments but I'm glad I did- it's added about £1000 to the overall claim!

 

I sent the letter on 1st Dec (makes it easier to track timescales!) and am just waiting for a response. Having read a few other posts, I'm not confident of a quick resolution (pity- Jan's going to be a long month).

 

I'm slightly nervous of contacting them now for normal, everyday stuff (I need a new card- Christams has given it a bit of a bashing) but I keep reminding myself that it's them that should be sheepish.

 

I'll let you know how I get on

[Wardle32]

No response from them yet. My deadline for them is 28th Dec- time to start an online claim!

 

Anyone have any idea what sort of timescales RBoS claims take? Are we talking weeks or months?

[ninekey]

I'm on the same kind of time track as you. Getting concerned now as I've had no acknowledgment at all to my LBA (sent on 6 Dec 06, stipulating a 14 day reply period.)

 

Does anyone have a fax number or valid email address for the RBS Customer Relations Unit in Edinburgh?

[isidore]

What you have to bear in mind is the added media exposure over the last few months has no doubt had a drastic increase to the number of people making claims, the current timescales are probably less achievable now than they were six months ago.

 

On top of that, you are going through your process at an awkward time with Christmas around - people on holiday, bank holidays and critically the post being up in the air around this time. RBS are (from my experience and also from reading others) good at responding in general. If you have deadlines like the 28th December, it's obviously going to be difficult to achieve these when half of your 14 days falls within the christmas period and christmas post. I'm not surprised that many people are having problems at this time!

 

It's a difficult call really. I know these banks don't really justify giving them any leeway considering the way they treat us but if it were me I would allow them some time to catch up. You might have a different opinion to me, but I would much prefer them to settle without me having to make a court claim. With HBOS, I sent them a letter around 21 days after sending my LBA (already 6 days over deadline) informing them that in 7 days time I would be filing my court proceedings (therefore giving them a total of 28 days in total to respond to my LBA) and sure enough they settled. You can read up on it from the link in my sig.

 

At this point, I guess it's a judgement call, you can either send them a reminder and give them an extended deadline (but your one and only extension), if you are good on the phone ring them and chase your response or continue to the next stage and make a court claim.

 

Don't panic, you are still on track whatever you do.

[Wardle32]

Thanks T4ff- however, I disagree about the court claim- I DO want to make one for several reasons:

 

1. the more cases against a bank, the more likely they are to make some changes to their charges- I don't want them to hide away in un-recorded settlements.

2. Once it goes to a claim it adds the 8% interest - which for me adds about £800. This is obviously a good thing for me financially, but also puts them under the same pressures that they put us under.

 

However, I do acknowedge that it's a busy time of the year and, despite the fact that they've happily charged me £60 referral charges in the week before Christmas for 3 of the last 6 years, I don't want to do anything that might jeopordise my case.

 

I'll call them this afternoon and see if I can get some timescales, but if I have no joy then I'll be opening proceedings.

 

As ever, I'll keep you informed

[isidore]

2. Once it goes to a claim it adds the 8% interest - which for me adds about £800. This is obviously a good thing for me financially, but also puts them under the same pressures that they put us under.

 

Well yeah there is that

 

If you want to progress it, I wouldn't bother with the phonecall, add a few more days to your deadline to compensate for the bank holidays / post then go to the next step.

[Wardle32]

Thanks T4ff, will do!

[Wardle32]

Just got a letter today acknowledging my first letter dated 29th Nov. They apologise for delay and ask for some time to look at the details.

 

I've already given them the 2 weeks to answer then sent my 2nd letter (LBA) and given them the 2 weeks plus I've given them an extra 8 days to allow for Christmas.

 

I think it's time to file my MCOL!

[barney911]

Looks like it's the standard letter, I got the same one today acknowledging my letter from the 29 November 2006. They're obvoiusly swamped given the recent media coverage:rolleyes:

[ninekey]

Yep, me too. I got the same letter today from Sandy Watt, re my LBA dated 6 Dec 06. Am concerned that this is part of the RBS' senior management directive to 'hold' all these cases, pending their taking a global policy view about what to do!

[tannaku]

Got exactly the same letter today even though I filed MCOL on the 5th December and RBS have mounted a defence.

 

The right hand doesnt seem to know what the left hand is doing it seems.

[Wardle32]

So with all these extra cases going through- does anyone have an idea of what timescales are like for actually getting the cash back?