GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

[Budgie]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

I also do not believe that GMAC RFC are seriously considering that they can get away with offering compensation interest on the basis of just 8% simple interest.

IE if they are refunding you £100 they will add 8% interest ( £8) irrespective of when you actually incurred these charges ( iE 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 etc)

Even the statutory interest applied to a court claim uses a calculation method which takes into account the amount of elapsed time between the date the charge was applied and the date of settlement.

Methinks a little letter to the FSA might be in order, it's fine for the FSA to say that they have resolved this issue but to do a complete job they should really fully resolve the matter of Customer redress.

[budgie3939]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

I phoned the general enquiries no. but she phoned me back having spoken to Head Office. The no. she called me back from was 01179 151900, I think her name was Carly or something similar. Very nice, helpful lady.

[Budgie]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

OK,

I am on the case.

I am waiting for a call from a spokesman at the FSA

I will speak to him and get the inofrmation we require straight from the horses mouth.

Will report back

Budgie

[Amethyst]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

I also do not believe that GMAC RFC are seriously considering that they can get away with offering compensation interest on the basis of just 8% simple interest.

I think the flat rate 8% is just what was agreed/negotiated with the FSA.

I think the regulatory intervention should strengthen any cases for individual refunds in court.


Don't agree on the 39% of the ERC tho Bud. Be interesting to see what Mr Cook has to say.

[ROBSTER]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

I think the flat rate 8% is just what was agreed/negotiated with the FSA.

I think the regulatory intervention should strengthen any cases for individual refunds in court.


Don't agree on the 39% of the ERC tho Bud. Be interesting to see what Mr Cook has to say.

Here we go with the old Flat rate again....no bank would be in business if they charged interest like that (same charge for money regardless of time) but they consider it ok to fob off their clients with it.
So say i had £100 in charges in 2004

Flat rate on £100 is £8

Statutory rate would be £40

No wonder they are keen to pay up!

They are saving 80% on interest in this way plus 40% from the FSA in ERD (early reimbursement discount) on the fine.

Who's eyes are they "pulling the wool over"?

Surly the FSA can see through it (most of them are numerate i would imagine) or are they "turning a blind eye" ?

[Amethyst]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

this bit @ bud - is the only that makes sense with what you were saying, and is the bit that has been misconstrued.

4.17.
These unfair charges were:
(1)
charges for non-payment of the monthly mortgage payment by direct debit, when the account was in arrears and no monthly payment was being made;



Which basically says the charge for other methods of payment shouldnt have been charged on months when no payment was made by ANY method. and its that which has been deeemed to be unfair.

Non-direct debit fees (usually charged when you pay by cheque or bank transfer to cover admin costs) levied on customers when they didn't make a payment (average refund £117).

Disappointing but makes absolute sense.

Nothing to do with late payment / administration fees.

[EXC]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

I've not read the thread in full so apologies for asking but are refunds automatic or do claimants need to claim. And does the same apply to the Swintons PPI case?

[Amethyst]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

automatic for current customers.

[EXC]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

automatic for current customers.

Whacko.

[Amethyst]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

From Budgie3939 - She said Head Office of the FSA have stated that the £50 arrears fee is AN UNFAIR CHARGE and GMAC should be refunding this as well.


And GMAC don't agree with that (from when Budgie3939 spoke to GMAC)


So there are certainly anomolies in understanding between the FSA and GMAC which need clarifying.

from the report it says

''(2)
calculation and imposition of the Early Repayment Charge on mortgage balances which included arrears fees and charges within that balance; and''

Which kind of says that they calculated the ERC based on the balance including arrears fees and should have subtracted arrears fees before calculating the ERC and its that difference will be refunded not the actual arrears fee itself - despite lots of discussion on disproportionate to cost arrears fees - which makes it incredibly confusing?

[ROBSTER]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

Here we go with the old Flat rate again....no bank would be in business if they charged interest like that (same charge for money regardless of time) but they consider it ok to fob off their clients with it.
So say i had £100 in charges in 2004

Flat rate on £100 is £8

Statutory rate would be £40

No wonder they are keen to pay up!

They are saving 80% on interest in this way plus 40% from the FSA in ERD (early reimbursement discount) on the fine.

Who's eyes are they "pulling the wool over"?

Surly the FSA can see through it (most of them are numerate i would imagine) or are they "turning a blind eye" ?

Having had that rant i should be due a tidy sum and will not be "looking a gift horse in the mouth" when the automatic cheque hits the mat. If it turns out its an attempt to leg clients over they will enjoy my wrath in the absence of "yule tide joy" . Bless

[Budgie]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

OK

I have spoken to the FSA

We are all guilty of misinterperting the situation.

The charges that the FSA based it's unfair decision on were as follows :-

1) The fee charged by GMAC-RFC when a Customer set up his account to pay by another method other than by direct debit. The FSA have not said that the amount of this charge was unfair only that the Customer should not have been charged this amount when the account was in arrears. They consider that it was OK for GMAC-RFC to charge for failure to pay by direct debit when the account was running normally ( IE not in arrears ).

2) Excessive Solicitors fees - The amount greater than the cost incurred by GMAC-RFC should be refunded.

3) ERC - The amount of ERC charged should be recalculated so as to be based only on the amount of mortgage outstanding ( ie any and all fees and charges added through the lifetime of the account should be subracted from the balance prior to calculating the ERC). So a smallish refund would be due to Customers who had been charged an ERC dependant on the amount of outstanding mortgage and the amount of charges that had been applied throughout the lifetime of the mortgage.

As part of the investigation the FSA did analyse the fees charged for a failed direct debit instruction ( usually £30 ) and the monthly arrears fee ( usually £50 ). The spokesman told me that they not find these fees to be unfair or excessive compared to the costs claimed to be incurred by GMAC-RFC. The FSA spoksman did say that a consumer could obviously challenge these charges on a individual basis if they thought them to be unfair.

So all in all I believe we are guilty of perhaps reading what we wished to read rather than what was actually written.

Customers are entitled to a refund but not as much or for the reasons we initially thought. The main issues of failed direct debit charges and monthly account fees remain unresolved although the FSA have carried out some investigation of these and have not found them to be necessarily unfair compared to the costs claimed by GMAC-RFC.

I need to check this out but in relation to the failed direct debit charges the FSA spokesman did say that when a Customer's direct debit failed then GMAC-RFC would incur a bank charge ( similar to the bank charge that a Customer would be charged by their personal bank ) and that these charges upon GMAC-RFC would have to be taken into account when considering whether the amount that GMAC-RFC charged their own Customer was unfair or not. The question still remains ( ie the test case ) as to whether that basic charge was unfair or not.

[ed.]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

There are serious contradictions in reality between that verbal account Budge and the actually release made by the FSA on the issue.

Ok they are assumption based but the fact the FSA didn't even bother to qualify 'unfair charges' in their release will have left lots of people unfairly optimistic.

The FSA want to look like Knights in Shining Armour here and are becoming far more active than ever before, basically because the Tories are interesting in sacking the lot of them from the rumours I hear (in my humble opinion they want to finally justify their existence) but their own shoddy releases are just as bad as the pointless reporting on the issue.

[Budgie]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

There are serious contradictions in reality between that verbal account Budge and the actually release made by the FSA on the issue.

Ok they are assumption based but the fact the FSA didn't even bother to qualify 'unfair charges' in their release will have left lots of people unfairly optimistic.

The FSA want to look like Knights in Shining Armour here and are becoming far more active than ever before, basically because the Tories are interesting in sacking the lot of them from the rumours I hear (in my humble opinion they want to finally justify their existence) but their own shoddy releases are just as bad as the pointless reporting on the issue.

Totally agree Ed.

[ed.]

Re: GMAC RFC will pay up to £7.7m customer redress

Not sure whether others will do the same, but I know someone who read these reports and thought breathing space was achieved, so I'm chasing down and will PCC again if needed prior to FOS - especially as there's the FSA involvement it could be interesting.

Personally I think the more the better here.