Chunky Linc Vs. HSBC

[jowalshy]

The "stay" thing basically means the claim can be put on hold.

[lateralus]

there's mention in the oft press release of all claims being stayed until the outcome of the test case - but we are hoping that claims close to resolution will carry on to conclusion - we are crossing fingers, eyes, and everything else. i'll look for the lincoln thing.

[chunkylinc]

Oh ok, Thank you, I understand now.

[lateralus]

is this is?Lincoln 'abuse' order

[Castlebest]

I love that Lincoln CC set of directions

 

pete

[chunkylinc]

Errrrrrrrrr DG do my nut in! Letter received this morning as follows...

 

Thanky you for your letter dated 24th July 2007. We will atempt to address the issues that you have raised.

 

You advise in your letter that both of our previous letters have been titled 'Without Prejudice' so contrary to our letter dated 7th July 2007 we will not be able to submit these as evidence in court.

 

You will note that both this letter and our letter dated 7 july 2007 are titled 'Without Prejudice save as to costs' (yer this is true i just checked, just that the save as costs bit appears on the line below) Therefore should you continue with your claim to hearing we will be ab;e to produce these letters to the court when the question of costs arises.

 

We do not concur with your view in relation to the provisions of section 32 of the Limitation Act 1980. Out client has never attempted to conceal the charges applied to your account. Charges applied to your account have always been clearly recorded, notice of which you will have received either by letter or specific details upon your statements of account. For this reason, we do not consider that there has been any concealment, deliberate or otherwise, on the part of our client.

 

We disagree that there has been any procrastination in this matter by either ourselves or by our client. As you will be aware parties involved within the litigation are encouraged to communicate and negotiate with each other with a view to settlement of issues which may be resolved, in order to avoid intervention of the court and resultant judicial time. We have attempted to enter into meaningful negotiations with you and consider that our client has made a most reasonable offer of settlement to you, which takes into account the charges applied together with statutory interest and court fees.

 

 

With regards to your comments with reference to overdraft interest our client is quite clear as to what you are claiming. We note your comments regarding your meticulous calculations but do not concur with the basis of your argument with regards to the overdraft interest that you are seeking to claim.

 

For example on 13 April 2003 you state that you interest of £48.40 was applied to your account with the balance of the account being £1830.71. This interest debited from your account on 5th May 2003 was for the period 14 march 2003 to 13 april 2003. The balance on your account on 5 may 2003 is immaterial to any calculations of interest as it falls outside the period mentioned above. As a further example your earliest claim of 4 november 1999 advises that £0.45 of the total interest charges of £3.81 related to the charge of £27.50. However, as in the previous example the interest actually relates to a period before the charge was applied to the account and as such the interest was charged on a previous overdrawn balance, which does not include the charge. Any calculations of interest and proportion attributable to penalty charges would need to take into account the average balance for the period concerned and average penalty charges. Your calculations clearly do not fulfil this criterion. As such we are unable to agree the refund of interest as requested. (Ohh Sh*t, it looks like I've done something wrong with my calculations? and Im really not sure what, I used the complex excel spreadsheet on this site, so im not really sure where i've gone wrong?)

 

At this juncture, it is necessary to re-iterate the HSBC is entirely confident that its charges are reasonable, are properly and fully disclosed in its terms and conditions and published price list and you must have been aware that you would incur such charges depending upon how you managed your financial affairs. HSBC is confident that it was entitled to apply these charges and that it would successfully resist your claim in the courts.

 

We re-iterate again that we consider that our client has made a most reasonable offer of settlement to you, which takes into account the charges applied together with statutory interest at 8% per annum, persuant to section 69 of the County Courts Act 1984. Again we wish to advise that should you continue with your claim to a hearing, we reserve the right to bring this letter to the attention of the court when the question of costs arises. By this we mean that our client has made a reasonable offer of settlement which you have rejected. In the event the court concurs with our view then we will seek an order that you pay our costs in continuing with the claim from todays date until conclusion.

We invite you to reconsider our clients proposal and if if is acceptable please sign and return the enclosed copy of this letter to us and we will arrange for a refund to be made to you.

 

We consider that our client's request for any agreed settlement to remain confidential is a reasonable. However, should you wish to strike through this portion of the settlement letter then we will seek our clients instructions in relation to making a payment to you without the confidentiality clause.

 

Yours Faithfully

 

DG Solicitors

 

(on next sheet of paper)

 

I accept the sum of £2834.78 in full and final settlement of my claim against HSBC for the charges applied to my account in the period 4th November 1999 to 16th May 2007 (cheeky b*ggers, my claim period is actually 4th Nov 99 to 7th March 07). I agree not to make any other claims relating to these charges. i also agree to keep the fact of my claim and HSBC's ex gratia paymeny strictly confidential.

[lateralus]

got to go listen to radio fivelive at 10 pm - something about bank charges,,,,,,,,

i'm thinking about this -

i know crusher would say hold out for the lot - (crusher is on holiday, drat!) let me get back.

[chunkylinc]

Umm im still a little concerned about the whole overdraft interest thing?

 

Have DG used this tactic with people before? If they feel that my calculations are wrong am I entitled to ask them to work it out and tell me what they or the bank feel it should be?

 

I've double checked the instructions for the spreadsheet and I followed them to the letter, i've put the date the interest was taken, how much it was and what the balance was at the time. Do you think my calculations are out because my debit interest charges actually come out of the account a month behind, so for instance interest for sept would appear on my statement as leaving in early Oct? maybe I need to re-do the spreadsheet, putting in all figures in a month earlier?

 

Or am I worrying unnecessarily because DG have got me spooked...!?!

[lateralus]

they do this - and frankly - i get a bit spooked too at this point - but if you are sure you've done it correctly - then hold out -

would it be worth a compromise offer at this point - would you be ha ppy with what they have offered and half of what you want over that -

 

you could play them at their own game - you are confident, blah,blah,

 

but to save everyone further time and money you would be willing to split the difference with them and lay it out how much. that's if you'd be happy with that.

 

not to be a downer but we have had one or two where they argue and argue and in the end you just have to give in or it looks like it will never finish. you have to weigh it up - and with all this oft stuff going on - i'd be tempted to ask for - politely but using their lingo (confident, assertive) that you'd settle for a 50/50 split on the difference - what do you think ----- please if no one else comes on to say - feel free to pm castlebest or one of the site helpers to get another view.

[chunkylinc]

Thanks for the advice guys...

 

I sent off a negotiating letter to DG 1st class recorded and I also dropped my letter into the court today, saying that DG had not filed a defence etc etc. The court told me that several of these cases were now put on stay, but they were a little behind with there letters...? They double checked mine and said that this was the case, I asked if my letter sould get to the judge and they said it would, I also said the letter was challenging the stay because DG had not submitted in time etc and the clerk said she'd get the manager to ring me back....

 

In the meanwhile DG call me (finally) and say thanks for my negotiation letter, but there's no point currently as they had confirmation from the court that the prelim hearing has been put on stay and hence they didnt need my new offer, but would possibly consider it depending on the outcome of the OFT test case. I informed DG that I had applied for the stay to be overruled (I'd sent them a copy with the negotiation letter) and If I heard further I'd let them know, he said that if that was the case then he would discuss my offer with hsbc blah blah.....

 

Then.......(this is like a mini story lol) I get back and the court had left a message on my answerphone confirming that the prelim hearing will proceed at 2pm tomorrow.

 

I then called DG, and informed them of this and instead of negotiating with me (which I thought they might well do after my last call) they simply replied..."fine we'll ensure a barraster attends"

 

Great! I was happy that I had managed to get the prelim hearing to continue, now im slightly nervous cause it looks like they are sending someone and because it's a prelim hearing, the notes from the court never said anything about prepairing a court bundle, like the normal trails, so I aint actually done anything....... I think Im now pretty shafted....?!

 

Should I try to prep some sort of mini bunble tonight? Will I be allowed to submit items on the day? I mean DG have not submitted any kind of paperwork and I was supposed to get copies 14 days prior to the prelim hearing? The time estimated for this was only 5mins, so I dont think it's going to be exactly major?

 

Has anyone else had one of these prelim hearings?

 

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr Help !

[jowalshy]

I nearly did. Were you actually told to submit papers prior to the hearing?

[lateralus]

i've flagged up your post for some help from the mods - just hang in there - the cavalry is on the way!

[lateralus]

ok, i've asked for help for you in two places so it should be forthcoming - but in absence of those with more about them - i'd say at the very least - you take letter number two from this thread:Application for removal of a stay - UPDATED TO ACCOUNT FOR OFT TEST CASE

 

or the one from this link:~~## Stays info and guidance ##~~

whichever one you like better.

 

plus from this thread:GOT A COURT DATE? A guide to the later stages

see what garyh says to take to a prelim. and take it.

:

[chunkylinc]

The only thing that I can see in the one and only bit of correspondence with Norwich County Court is point 5 of the general Form of Judgement or Order which said.. "The Claimant may make representations to the court in writing provided these are received by the court and served on the defendant not less than 5 days before the preliminary hearing..."

 

So the only thing that I've sent is a letter asking not to stay and informing the judge that I had not received any paperwork from DG re this hearing and that the 14 deadline has passed. Also that I had tried to contact DG several times to resolve the issue and hence I did include copies of my DG nudging letters.

 

So maybe im worrying about nothing and dont need to do a proper court bundle at all.

[Audreygreeneyes]

my hearing was the same as yours for tomorrow and EVERY one has been stayed... total blanket stay....... despite the fact that DG faile dotmeet the deadline..........

 

I handed in to the court as my representations a letter on page 15 of my thread along with ever letter,fax and email I sent them....... so it might be worth taking that with you....... but also the stay that you have been given the link for....

 

They have possibly told oyu they are sending a Barrister to frighten you off into not attending.......

 

what I would also do is type up an acceptance offer and take that with you as well............ and if you want to be really cheek add wasted courts costs into it............. remember you have the upper hand not them.......they have to risk going in frontof the judge and him finding in your favour....

 

they might jsut settle:) good luck

[steven4064]

chunkylink

 

Sorry no one from the 'team' has replied to this - lots of people away. Its a bit late now and I don't know what the prelim hearing is for. However, my advice is:

 

take stuff about removing the stay in case thats relevant

 

take basic statement of evidence so you can outline the case

 

take bank T&Cs if you've got them

 

which is basically what lateralus said.

 

Good luck - let us know how you get on. I will be online for a short while if you have any quetsions

[Castlebest]

Chunky, its just a preliminary hearing as steven said print out the objections to the stay and take all of your letters with you.

 

If a barrester shows he will have nothing with him and trust me if the judge gets a chance he would love to make him look a fool.

 

Dont try to be clever or legal just tell it how you see it, the court recognises your an ordinary guy who may not know the correct legal terminology.

 

Dont panic, listen to what the judge asks you and reply honestly.

 

you will be fine go get em

 

pete

[caro]

I suggest that you also take a copy of the draft directions with you, although they should have been submitted before, but it's worth a shot. Apologise to the judge for them being late, and explain that as a litigant in person this is all new to you.

 

The draft directions can be found in the template for completing the AQ, but just do them on a word document.

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/bank-templates-library/11644-allocation-questionnaires-guide-completion.html#post90319

[Audreygreeneyes]

Chunky good luck with your hearing today, if it does go ahead whne yo come back could you possibly give us your claim number , then we can use it to show that not all courts are issuing blanket orders....

 

also if DG make you an offer outside the court, it would be really helpful to have the refe number, as it coudlbe quoted in a letter to the oft, who willbe VERY interested indeed to know that they have settled claims after the agreement.......

 

GOOD LUCK PLEASE LET US KNOW HOW YOU GOT ON:D

[lateralus]

yes, please chunky - get back - we are sitting here with head hurting from wishing you all these positive thoughts - what happened???

[Audreygreeneyes]

well it was at 2 pm lattie, so he might not be home yet. I did phone them this am and was told that some cases had been stayed but the majority were going ahead........

[jowalshy]

Any news????

[Audreygreeneyes]

well ti can only be 1 of 2 things. eh has gotten his dosh and is having a pint or 2 or he didnt get it and is still ahving a pint or 2.............lol

[jowalshy]

Has anyone heard anything????

[Audreygreeneyes]

nope he has not been on the site so far........ so no news