Electrode101 v Halifax

[electrode101]

Hi all, thanks for having me.

 

Been reading about all this stuff for a couple of months now, sent me DPA letter a few weeks ago, already had a response from me Bank "Hafilax" mainly asking me to confirm they can charge me a fiver to send me statements to me. I had to phone and say that as my letter suggested that I had authorised them to charge me the maximum 10 quid they can charge and so they agreed to charge me a fiver. So just waiting for me statements now, but in the mean time I done some more digging around and wondered a few things. I'll tell you a little story about me past, this will help you understand where I'm coming from.

Many years ago, approx 6 years ago I used to earn a fair amount of cash. This as most things in life had a sudden end and caused me lots and lots of stress. One of the stresses this caused was to force me to move house, upon moving house I contacted the hafilax to change my addresses. As with all things hafliax this should have changed my addresses on all me linked accounts. The accounts I had were 1 switch card, 1 Solo Card and 1 Credit card. I always used the switch card and often from this point had charges applied for various reasons, mainly being unemployed for 6 months it was lack of funds in my account. Also my credit card was not being paid and I was unable to claim the insurance I had paid cos I was over me limit on that as well. So they put me accounts under head office control. This meant I was paying 10 quid a month on me credit card and they stopped charging interest on it, the limit was 2700. Six months later I found out that the amount owed was 3700. what hafilax had not told me was that they started to charge interest and fees again and also charging me for the insurance that I could not claim, this meant they was increasing me balance by around 75 to 100 per month without telling me. Anyway I had a right old argument with them about that and they paid back a small fortune and reduced the amount I owed to around 2500, Woohoo. In the mean time my solo card was having a fun time as well, also without my knowledge. It was a cardcash account, an account with no overdraft. Apparently it went over drawn because of a cash withdrawal; however they could not give me the details of this as they had sold the account to a company called Thames credit Limited. This company also could not give me details as they had bought the debt and not the details. Hafilax had sold it with a debt of 390 which now stood and 566. This happened around 4.5 years ago. Hafilax had never sent a letter telling me this account had problems, nor did they stop me Switch card and claim the monies from their, which is what the credit card did all the time whenever they wanted me to contact them. Anyway Thames credit filed a default on my name which has blighted my credit record ever since. Due to my poor credit I had to purchase a car through Yes Car Credit, which charges a stonking 29.9% interest. So over 4 years I had to pay over 10,000 quid for a 5000 quid car. So the question is this, If I can prove the Halifax made a mistake/illegally charged my solo card which put me in debt with them, which caused the default, which pushed me into a poor credit rating does anybody think I could claim the 5000 quid back from them for their mistake and get me credit record repaired.

Currently my situation is Great, I have opened an account with a new bank, I have 1 payment left on me car, I have paid of the 2500 left on me credit card about 3 months ago and am looking forward to being in the black again. I recon my current account has a good few grand to claim back also, not sure about that until my statements arrive though. Anyway any help/suggestions would be well appreciated.

[stan5131]

Yes. I have read the thread of someone doing this at the moment. I am trying to think who it is. Let me think and will post back.

[Rooster-UK]

Hi Electrode.

 

Start by spending a few days reading the FAQs and the step by step guide in the library section. That will answer most of your questions.

Start your own thread in the Halifax Forum and post any questions and progress reports there.

That way we can monitor your progress and offer advice when you need it that is tailored to your needs.

 

Good luck with your claim.

 

Regards Rooster.

[stan5131]

I just cant think who it was. Does anyone else know?

[stan5131]

I got compensation from Abbey for default after reclaiming charges (1 2)

 

There you go

[MARTIN3030]

For you to have real success with this you will need to gather a good deal of paperwork that will show dates transactions figures etc etc.

A full S.A.R to Halifax will turn up some info which you can reconcile.

You should be prepared to deal with both defaults and charges on the one claim and will have to be in open court NOT moneyclaim.

You may find some useful info on our very own Jonni2bads

thread with his Halifax claim.

You need also to have as much info as you can muster from both the dca and credit reference agencies.I would send the two quid to all three mycallcredit equifax and experian.

Are you sure it was a dca and not Halifax who issued the default ?

If it was first issued by Halifax then they would have had to notify you according to law.

The dca would then have re-registered it after they bought the debt.

It is quite a complex process and can get quite confusing the secret is filing everything properly and working to a manageable schedule taling each step at a time and progressing by results/non results as the case may be.

You will need a clear head and lots of patience with this one.The secret is having an understanding and getting the paperwork in place.

Dont forget the s10 notices to both the bank and dca this will come in useful in time to come.

File everything and stuff you have from the past too.

You will need to run threads in both debt and Halifax.

There have been positive results on this side but as I say it can get quite complex and will rely on you being able to put together a good case based on info that you are able to supply in hard evidence.

[MARTIN3030]

Dont forget although the Data protection act offers scope to claim compensation,at the end of the day this is at the discretion of the court and therefore is not set in stone.

In Jonnie2bads case the Judge dismissed his case saying that the default issues should have been sorted with the money side.We now advise all claimants with default issues to tie these in with the charges for court.

Again have a look at his thread.

[electrode101]

An update, received a letter from hefilax telling me they have received my letter regarding defaulted account and they I will be getting my statements soon. Not soon enough as I'm concerned sent them the letters on the 6th Dec 06. They have until the 15th Jan to satisfy my request or I’ll be onto the information commissioner.

they like to make you wait don't they

[electrode101]

Well finally I have received my statements back from my first Halifax account. I am somewhat disappointed as I have worked out they only owe me 312 quid. I was thinking they owed me thousands on this account, I was always getting charges for this that and the other. Just seems I always phoned and moaned about them so I think most of them were stopped. Oh well

Anyway, I’m still awaiting my information regarding the account that was defaulted. This one will probably only have 1 charge which spiraled out of control as I never got statements or letters about it. Hopefully I will be able to get the default removed and claim back the interest I had to pay on me car which was 29.9%, so their should be about 5 grand on that one. I’ll keep you posted on progress

[electrode101]

an update:

 

Well no reply yet to my request of payment of 312, I'll be sending my LBA on Monday. I had checked my account details today which I often do and I noticed a couple of ATM transactions from Romania. seems my card has been cloaned in a cash machine somewhere, it's very strange that I didn't notice anything dodgy about any cash machines I've used in the past couple of months. I often wonder about the legality of Tesco's Chip and Pin units, I may be going off topic here but wondered if anybody had anything to add to that. I wondered, as I fitted those units in Safeways I understood that you put the card into the chip and pin unit and put your pin into the same unit. In tescos they seem to swipe it in the till and ask for the pin in the external card reader, this means that your Pin number is being allowed into Tesco's computers for additional authorisation. the way it should work is that Tesco's request a transaction, put the transaction number against your card and your pin varifies it without the knowledge of the tescos computer systems. just a thought.

anyway back to my main point. Halifax havent replied to my request for statments for the defaulted account yet either and the 40 days is nearly up for that, so I might be dealing with the information commisioner next.

 

thanks for reading my update.

 

Cheers all

[electrode101]

An update on life:

Got a letter from Hefilax this moring advising me that I will be charged 39 quid for a failed DD on the 15th. so I just phoned them and reminded them that the cash was their until it got stolen and they have removed the 39 quid charge immidiatly. no point them argueing with me I suppose. I'll only end up claiming it back throught the court.

 

I thought it was a better letter before I opened it up. oh well, still waiting.

[electrode101]

Another update:

 

Well Halifax have not responded to my SAR request on my defaulted account and so today I sent them the 7 day notice before legal action letter.

They also have not responded to my demand for repayment of the 312, so again today I have sent in the post the LBA giving them 7 days to cough up.

I also sent today a SAR to Yes Car Credit as I was told that it was part of the deal to get Payment protection insurence. this I thought I had to do, but it seems I didn't and so this means I was mis sold the PPI, not happy about that.

 

Having fun.

[electrode101]

I got a letter from Halifax yesterday, thought I would post it here.

 

 

Dear Mr 101

I am Writing in reference to the letter we have received on the 23rd January.

 

First of all I want to apologise that you have not received an earlier response from us as per your data protection act subject access request dated the 08th Decmeber.

 

I have checked our complaints folder for this year and unfortunatly it would appear that we have not received any previous correspndence from you. (How True, it was last year as you just stated the 8th December)

 

Due to the nature of your complaint(funny a subject access request isn't a complaint, what follows is) and as you are making a request for a payment of charges deducted from your account dating back to the year 2000 (Strange, how do they know I will be making a request for payment), I have transferred your complaint to our customer relations department.

 

They will be in touch shortly by letter to confirm receipt of your complaint.

 

You will find enclosed a copy of the Blah blah blah blah procedure.

 

Your concerns will be dealt with as quickly as possible, but if you need to speak to me in the meantime, Please telephone me on the number at the top of this letter.

 

 

Now here is the thing. I sent them two seperate letters, regarding two seperate issues on two seperate accounts. it seem they have confused the whole situation. as in my first post I stated I was dealing with two seperate accounts. one is in default, one is not and is fully fucntioning as my main bank account. I have received my SAR on the current account and have already requested a refund, this refund is on it's LBA which expires on Monday. the defaulted account is also on the 7day LBA before action for failing to supply my SAR. if they fail by then what do I do.

 

Do I put in a money claim on the defaulted account and request they remove my default notice and estimate damages to myself as a result of this default notice. Please help me on this, currently I estimate that this default has cost me in excess of £5000, in higher interest rates. And if they can't supply any information to support this then do I have a strong case for the removal and compensation.

 

My thread is feeling rather empty of support and help from people, come on. Stick your ore in.

[electrode101]

I phoned them up this morning to advise them that this is two seperate issues. she advised me that she has passed it to the complaints department. she said it can take upto 4 weeks to get a responce as per their terms and conditions of the complaints procedure. I stated that on monday the 47th day is up and that is when I take it forward to the next stage.

she did a bit of chasing for me and kept phoning to keep me posted, which was nice. but her answer of 4 weeks kind of pleased me as I can now take legal action against their failure to comply with a data protection act request. I think my other claim of 312 is being delt with in the same instant. I'll file this claim seperatly. Woohoo

[electrode101]

well, got no responce to my claim of 312 also sent LBA giving another 7 days. this was up on monday and so I filled MCOL for me current account.

 

Still no responce to my SAR on my defaulted account, I need to take em to court on that one but am unsure of how to word the N1 form.

anyway I sent an S10 and CCA request to both halifax and Thames Credit to varify the defualted account. they have 12 days to respond to the CCA, hopefully they will fail and I can have the debt written off after the full 39????. I will also then claim for damages that the default has caused my finacial life since the defualt was set. I have credit reports from Equifax & Experian. both say I'm a shady character and cannot be trusted with loans. (Cheers Halifax) and to top it all off I got a rejection notice from Virgin Credit cards to prove I'm unable to obtain credit at a decent rate. this will hopefully prove that I had no choice but to goto yes car credit for a car and pay the extortionate rate of interest and forced PPI(which I'm gonna claim back now).

[electrode101]

it's getting lonley in here.

 

just got a big bundle of paper work from Halifax Glasgow, not sure what it is yet, the misses told me. going home at lunch to have a read through it.

it's to do with the defaulted account though. I'll update you all later.

 

Halifax still havent settled the 312 pound either yet on the current account, Court papers have been served.

[electrode101]

some interesting things going on with My Halifax claims

 

the defaulted account is no longer a default, the debt has been writen off and the default notice removed. this I got confirmation of this today by post, I knew already as I had a credit report done on the 5th and it was there and another on the 7th and it had gone. so as they removed it without so much as a fight I'm going ahead with compensation for ruining my credit history for over 4 years.

 

with my current account they called me yesterday to make me an offer.

the phone conversation started with her telling me that they find the charges are fair and within their terms and conditions of the account, but they will be offering me a goodwill gesture of £360ish. I said thats funny the original claim was only 312(before you think why did I do that, it's cos I had a feeling they were mixing things up and I needed to straighten things out). so I asked her for a breakdown of the goodwill gesture. she said it was 170ish for my current account and 190ish for the defaulted account. I asked her why they were offering me a gesture on that as I have not made a claim against it, in fact halifax havent even satisfied the SAR yet. at this point she started to stutter a lot. I then pointed out that if they think the charges are justified why are they offering me anything at all, why don't you just defend it in court. again I think she was a bit shocked by this cos she didn't know what to say. I then asked her to break down the cost of the charges, she said she could not as they were a trade secret(I bet they are,just like the magic circle has secrets. I bet banks pull their charges from the same magic hat). she then went on to offer £320 on the current account in full and final settlment, which I refused. then she said that she would only offer the £320 offer if I sent proof that I canceled the court claim. I said No. she was gonna send it anyway, I said save the trees, don't bother. so anyway, she sent it and it arrived this morning with a set of statments regarding the defaulted account. so now at last after over 2 months I can find out why the defualted account went over drawn in the first place.

 

so on with the main account, it's in the court process, they have until the 14th Feb to say they are going to defend. the total claimed is currently 446, this is 312 original charges + 84 interest + 50 court costs.

 

time to start a new claim to the total of 4500, this is what I have calculated my losses to be over the past 4/5 years of having to pay higher interest rates on HP&Credit cards.

 

so 1 battle Won on with the rest of the War.

[electrode101]

Grrrrr, Halifax are going to Defend, LOL.

 

so does that give them 28 days since it was deemed served or 28 days from when they ackowldged the claim and said they are going to defend the whole amount. I hope it's the former not the latter. if it's the latter it's just a huge big delay in an already slow process.

 

any tips at this point

[sea-sidelady]

Hi electrode,

Typical isnt it..!

 

The 28 days is from it was deemed served so its only an additional 14 days.

 

If the defendant acknowledges the claim, they have 28 days from the date the claim was deemed served to settle or defend the claim.

 

Failure to settle or defend the claim within 28 days of the date the claim was deemed served means you can file for judgment against them.

But there is a good chance they will pay up now. So keep checking your account, just in case.

[electrode101]

I bet they leave it right until the last minute and seconds. I recon they are gonna bunch together both claims again and try and hide settlement of 1 as both and close the default case at the same time. I need to keep a close eye on them. they already tried to settle both claims with 1 settlement.

[electrode101]

Well Halifax have paid in full my original claim in cash straight to my account and another payment of the interest and the court fee.

 

Just need to leave it in the account until the confirmation letter has been sent, don't want them saying that it's settlement of both claims in 1.

 

so the celebrations can wait.

 

Still waiting for settlement of the defaulted account, the thread for that is in the general debt section. not that it's a debt anymore cos they writen it and my default notice off. just claiming compensation for that now.

 

so 1st battle Won but the war is still raging. let the final battle commence.

[Janet-M]

oops I was a bit premature changing your thread to ** WON** then It was from what you posted in the watchdog programme thread , sorry

[electrode101]

Bless, well as far as I'm concerned this thread has been fully won. the cash they entered into my account is exactly what the 1st claim is for. so please feel free to add it to WON cases. I already made a donation of 25 quid sometime ago as I had faith in this Site and all those who help. I shall on friday when I get paid donate 5% of what I'll be winning in my next battle. a little premature but hey I'm sure I'll win that one as well, Although I will be needing a lot more help in that as it's compensation that I'm claiming for and their does not seem to be any clear cut advice on that.

[electrode101]

Well time to celebrate my first victory with halifax. they sent confirmation that they have settled now and the cash is already in my account. it's just time to start spending it.

Filled out the survey just now and already made a donation ages ago as I knew I was gonna win.

 

Battles left to fight are:Halifax Defaulted account:Direct Auto Finance mis sold PPI:O2 for registering a bad debt on my credit report and not actually being a customer of theirs. on with the new battles