Santander withholding my money - suspected fraud - **SETTLED full amount+Court Fee+Compo**

[bradybunch]

sure.

1. Refuse any offer of partial refund of my money. The bank already offered to pay £621 out of the £4k odd.

2. Move on the interest rate and amount I calculated as applicable to the balance withheld at the bank. I used the overdraft interest rate.

3. Insist on my position regarding the provision of supporting documentation for the source of funds. Santander have asked for documents I dont have e.g. V5 of the vehicle

[BankFodder]

So all of this is to do with recovering the money – which was the basis of your original claim but which has already been pointed out to you failed to refer to any valid cause of action – meaning any valid basis upon which you should be able to claim the money in a court of law.

In terms of basing the amount of money that you are claiming on the banks owned overdraft rate, this is entirely reasonable – but am afraid it pretty well never happens – and actually if you wanted any chance of obtaining redress on that basis, then you would have had to have claimed for an "account of profits" – which is a procedure where you would ask the court to order the bank to reveal the extent of the profits that they had made on your money while holding it and then to pay those profits over to you.
This is a complicated procedure for such a small sum and would also take you away from the small claim court rules in terms of costs.
I'm afraid that you will eventually have to give up claiming interest at this rate – even though, of course, it is an entirely reasonable position to take.

I'm afraid that the whole thing is really missing the point – but am afraid that this is a consequence of the way you have pleaded your case.

The questions you really should be asking is on what basis have they decided to withhold the whole sum from you – what legal basis that they have for this.
If you accepted the partial payment that they have offered you, what would it take for you to recover the rest of the money.
If this money is the proceeds of crime – then why are they holding it? It should be turned over to the police who are the only lawful authority to have custody over the proceeds of crime – even if they then designated the bank to keep on holding it.
If the bank considers that the money is the proceeds of crime – then have they informed the police? What is the please reference number? Has there been an investigation? And if so then you would like access to the records of the investigation so that you can then understand their position and challenge it properly.
It will could be completely unfair for them to carry out an investigation in secret, which has punitive consequences for you, and which you are not able to challenge because effectively you have been convicted by a secret process.
It is completely unfair that if they are taking this action because they believe that you have committed a crime, that they have not informed the police. They have a clear duty to inform the police that a crime has been committed. In this way, you would agree to be arrested and then to stand trial where the matter would be judged openly and all the evidence would be made public.
If the bank is not prepared to do this then they are acting unfairly.

The treatment outlined above which you are suffering – which is mainly that you have been the subject of a secret investigation and that the proper authorities – the police – have not been involved – is unfair treatment and is contrary to the banks statutory obligations under BCOBS in which the bank has a duty to treat you fairly and to communicate with you fairly.

Let me say right now, that the mediation will probably refuse to go into this because these are not issues that you raised in your case. I can imagine that the bank will decline to deal with it precisely is because you have not refer to any of this in your particulars of claim.
I'm afraid that I expect the mediation will fail – and then there will be a date set for a court hearing. If you are lucky, a judge may be prepared to hear you on the issues which I have listed above – even though you have not pleaded them.
However, I have a sense that you may be heading for an amended particulars of claim or even a withdrawal and a fresh issue of proceedings.

The issue of unfair treatment under BCOBS is the issue that you should have raised in your particulars of claim initially. This would then have put the bank in a position where they would have had to answer the points which I have suggested above.
As I said, I'm afraid that I think it's unlikely that they will be prepared to get into a discussion of the above points for the reasons I've already pointed out

 

[bradybunch]

I dont quite understand your response. The plan is to go with a witness statement once the court sends the N157. the statement will then be particularised. I am now confused as to your previous contributions to this matter tbh.

 

 

[AndyOrch]

I would bear in mind that the mediation process is merely a tick box exercise in this instance and its not expected to resolve the matter but purely as an opportunity to get further information from the defendant and test the water if they are prepared to go all the way to to a hearing.

 

The mediator will not be qualified or experienced enough to mediate on the above points but rather to try to narrow any differences with view to trying to reconcile parties.

 

With regards to interest on the claim I would keep it to the standard section 69  8% interest which can be awarded by the the court at their discretion...you did opt for interest when you filed your claim ?

[BankFodder]

I don't think I've changed my position at all. I'm simply trying to highlight the fact that the points you want to discuss during the mediation still don't rely on any legal basis.
The points I think you should be dealing with – are the ones I've outlined above – and if at all possible you should steer the conversation towards that but I expect that the mediator will try to tell you that they are not up for discussion in this mediation because they have not been raised in your claim. I expect that the bank will refuse to discuss them because the bank is likely to say that they are only prepared to deal with the issues which you raised in your claim.

It seems to me quite likely that the mediation will be all about whether you should accept the payment which has already been offered. It seems to me that as long as everyone is clear that you are prepared to accept the money simply to reduce the outstanding amount – but not as any kind of settlement and that the litigation must go ahead unless they agree to return all the money (which they won't).

At the outset I had suggested that you may need to amend the claim. It was my site team colleague @Andyorch who had pointed out that although your claim did not identify any cause of action, the defendant bank was still prepared to deal with various issues and to include them in their defence so on that basis, it seemed as if they were prepared to go ahead on the basis of your claim. My site team colleague was right because it was an opportunity maybe to proceed on the basis of the claim you have made so far.
I don't think that a mediation process has the scope to enlarge the basis of your claim. I don't think the mediator has the authority to say to the bank that they must discuss issues which are not contained in the claim. And as I've said, I don't expect the bank would be prepared to do so anyway. I rather think that the points that I've raised are probably uncomfortable for the bank to deal with.

It's for this reason that I don't think the mediation will work and I think it will have to go to court. If it then goes to court, then you have the opportunity to tender your witness statement which we will help you produce and which will raise the points that I have suggested above – and any other points that my site team colleague has to suggest as well.
The judge has the authority to accept these other arguments – although I would expect that the judge would then give time to the bank to specifically defend those new points which you are raising.

So the effect of my last post is basically to say that I don't expect the mediation to work. However, you may as well try and raise some of the points that I've made – but I don't expect that you will be permitted to.
I think it would be a good idea to try at least and tell the mediator that you are prepared to accept the payment on offer but only on the basis that other than that nothing has changed and that the matter must still go before a hearing for a proper decision

[AndyOrch]

And to clarify have you checked to see if Santander have placed a Cifas Entry (sometimes referred to as a Cifas Marker) on your credit file a potential fraud warning, visible to prospective lenders. ?

 

 

.

[BankFodder]

Good point. How delicious it would be if they hadn't done that

[bradybunch]

Hi folks,

 

mediation failed. bank offered £620 + court costs. 

 

[AndyOrch]

And ....?

[bradybunch]

the case will be referred to court. I am happy to file for an amendment as I didnt attach my PoC within the 7 day period. is this the right time to start that process?

 

Thanks

 

To your question. I refused, the offer. They confirmed that they didn't file a police report, they just weren't happy with the proofs of source that i provided.

[AndyOrch]

We have already covered that extensively...the court the defendant have accepted your particulars...you didn't tick (opt) to serve separate particulars.

 

You will expand at the next stage of the process when you submit your statement of case.

 

So what grounds did they rely on for preventing you access to your 4 K ...simply they weren't happy with your explanation of the money trail...so they will hold on to it ?

[bradybunch]

yes. that's their only grouse. they didn't file anything with the police or raise any other question. nothing with CIFAS as well

[AndyOrch]

Well the whole purpose of entering into mediation was to get information not mentioned in their defence...it was never to settle the claim.

It appears that you really don't have much to add...apart from no Police or CIfas action taken.....so we are really no further on.

 

Any way lets await he Notice of Allocation N157 with the courts directions and dates and then you can start to prepare your statement of claim.....bear in mind its not for you to justify...but for them to prove their actions and what evidence its based on.

[BankFodder]

Well if they haven't filed a police report and particularly if they haven't placed the marker with CIFAS then I think that this is particularly unfair.

It seems to me that they are withholding your money and yet not following through with all the correct procedures.

I think there is definitely a basis for unfair treatment here and I think they should be raised when you eventually do your WS.

[bradybunch]

Hello team,

 

after a long hiatus, I received the Notice of Transfer of Proceedings on Thursday. What do i need to do by way of preparation of the Statement of Case please.

Thanks

BB

 

 

CivilMoneyClaim.pdf

[dx100uk]

await notice of allocation to your appointed court

[BankFodder]

The notice which you have received from the court – which you have posted above, looks as if you found it in a wastepaper bin. Is that right?

[bradybunch]

NO. That's not right. 

[bradybunch]

Hi team,

 

I received the confirmation of the court details over the weekend.

courtorder1.pdf

[dx100uk]

you await that court to contact you.

 

 

[BankFodder]

I think you should start reading up BCOBS. Although you haven't mentioned the statutory obligations in your claim, I think you are going to have to refer to them quite often at the hearing.
You really haven't given any basis for getting your money back – simply you want it back.

I think you're going to have to emphasise that although you didn't claim a breach of statutory duty, effectively this is what has happened and that the bank is treat you unfairly by withholding your money, by not making any proper enquiry, by not registering it with CIFAS, but not informing the police so that an independent investigation can take place and also by holding onto the money.
I think that even if you lose this case, I think you need to get a clear indication for the bank as to what they intend to do with the money. If the bank's position is upheld then clearly the judge will agree with them that there may have been fraud and that means that they are hanging on to the proceeds of fraud.

 

It seems to me in that case that the bank has a clear duty to inform the police and also to pass the money onto the police so that it is in their custody.
If this could get out to the police then I think you would be in a very good position because the police will either conduct an investigation or eventually decide that there was nothing to investigate and the money would be returned to you.

It's really clear that in these "suspected fraud" cases, the banks have the bit between their teeth and they do whatever they want. They are largely unaccountable.

[bradybunch]

Thanks a bunch BankFodder. I received an order from the court yesterday to submit a proper POC by the 21st otherwise the case will be struck out

courtorder2.pdf

[BankFodder]

Who is Mrs Anderson?

What is a form D11?

[bradybunch]

Hi BankFodder. I don't understand your response. Not sure if it was meant for me.

[BankFodder]

One of course it was meant for you. In your comments which you have made on the banks defence, you mentioned a form D11 and also you mention a Mrs Anderson.