time*to*change

[time*to*change]

We've been with RBOS for years (account/credit card/mortgage/loan) and have accepted charges as the occasional downside of having a reasonable income but being a bit careless with our money. However today the worm has turned! My credit card has been just over the limit the last 3 months when interest has been added (this time by less than £5 and that only because of the £12 charge for the previous month's sin) and today I've received a letter hiking my interest rate to 24%. I'm furious but of course can't afford to pay off the balance and close the account.

 

Apparently the companies are doing this to claw back the money they're losing in reduced/reclaimed charges ... so I may as well claim my share!!! I'm about to send the letter asking for statements for my bank account. Is it possible to claim for credit card charges too?

 

Great website by the way. An hour ago I was like this: ,but now I feel I can do something positive I'm getting back to:

 

"Statements requested" letter posted: 26/03/07

Statements received: 12/04/07

[isidore]

In short....yes!

 

These are no different to Current Account Charges. Why don't you go to the RBS successes forum and do a search on "credit card" you will find lots of entries come up I'm sure.

 

Keep the questions coming and good luck

[superward]

Hi,

 

Yeah, you can claim back the charges however from what I have read, a lot of the time, they will only give you back the difference between the original charge and the new OFT £12 charge that came in.

 

I have had a similar situation with Egg card just arise also. Been a customer with them for about 5 years or so and have not been over my balance in the past couple of years or missed a payment in the last 2 years either. Before that I did mismanage for a summer at uni and because of this my rate has been hiked to 21.9% from 15.9% in November last year!

 

Think I may challenge the charges on my Egg account now also in thinking about it!

 

superward

[isidore]

Superward, they might only OFFER you back the difference between the original charge and the new OFT £12 charge that came in, but that is certainly not what you are entitled to.

 

Have a read of this. This is in relation to whatever charge amount the OFT decides for bank accounts but it is the same for credit cards.

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/general/70359-about-oft-impending-report.html

[superward]

Hi T4FF,

 

Aha, I see. Thanks for that, just had a read over and it makes much better sense now.

 

Not had many dealings with charges on credit cards yet ...I may have to look out some old statements.

 

Cheers,

superward

[isidore]

Just bear in mind the OFT's ruling is nothing more than a guideline so it doesn't say that £12 is lawful - it's just closer to being lawful than £28 is!!

[time*to*change]

Superward: I've got an Egg card too - here's hoping they don't do the same to me. It makes me so cross. Raising rates so drastically makes it harder for people to pay and even more likely they'll default. What these companies are really doing of course is squeezing as much money as they can out of people who probably haven't the means to pay off their outstanding balance and tell them where to go (like me!).

[time*to*change]

Well I've won. Haven't been keeping this thread updated so here goes with the full timeline:

 

Request for statements: 26/03/07

Request for refund: 14/04/07

LBA: 14/05/07

Offer of full and final payment received: 21/06/07

 

I decided to wait after the LBA rather than push on with the claim after 14 days because I knew from reading other posts on here that RBS seemed to be taking 6/7 weeks to get round to a case but would then offer. Personally I preferred the wait to the hassle of dealing with their solicitors etc. even if in the end I still got the money plus some interest.

 

Only other thing probably worth mentioning is that I did use the template letters on here as a starting point, but altered and simplified them to be more in my own style.

 

Thank you CAG for your help - in the end it was relatively straightforward, but I know if I had needed to take things further you would have been there to help me!