Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

[Legal Beagles]

As many people start the New Year with a financial hangover, the Office of Fair Trading is urging people to make a New Year’s resolution to begin thinking now about saving for next Christmas.

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[leclerc]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

145/10 29 December 2010
As many people start the New Year with a financial hangover, the Office of Fair Trading is urging people to make a New Year's resolution to begin thinking now about saving for next Christmas.
The OFT is providing practical advice to people wishing to avoid the financial strain they may have faced this Christmas as part of its Save Xmas campaign. Top tips include:

• Plan early - be realistic about what you are going to need for next year and budget accordingly.
• Look at your options - find out about the pros and cons of post office, bank, building society and credit union savings schemes, as well as Christmas clubs, supermarket stamps and hamper schemes. Details on all the options are available at www.consumerdirect.gov.uk/savexmas
• Take action - choose the best option for you, and start putting some money aside.

David Murphy, Head of Campaigns at the Office of Fair Trading, said:
'It may seem a bit early to be thinking about next Christmas, when many of us are still eating the leftovers from this one. But we want people to be in a position to enjoy Christmas without getting into financial difficulties and that often requires a bit of forward planning. It's all too easy to overspend so that we can create a special and memorable time for our friends and family. The idea of saving money can be daunting but there is practical help available.'
Citizens Advice Bureaux has supported the OFT in encouraging people to save through this campaign. Their Head of Financial Capability, John Rhodes, added:
'Every year we see lots of people struggling with the financial and emotional challenges of post Christmas debt. But with a bit of planning you can look into the options available and set up a savings plan that's right for you. Why not make a New Year's Resolution to avoid a Christmas debt hangover next year.'
Further information on the Save Xmas campaign is available at www.consumerdirect.gov.uk/savexmas or to order your free copy of the leaflet giving a quick guide to paying for Christmas please call 0800 389 3158.
If you would like to interview the OFT about the Save Xmas campaign please contact the OFT press office on 0207 211 8133 or out of hours on 07774 134814.
NOTES

1. Following the collapse of Farepak hamper company in 2006 the Government announced £1 million funding for the Office of Fair Trading to conduct a consumer awareness campaign on Christmas saving schemes and mainstream alternatives. Save Xmas was launched on 1 June 2007.
2. The Citizens Advice service is a network of independent charities that helps people resolve their money, legal and other problems by providing information and advice and by influencing policymakers. For more information in England and Wales see www.citizensadvice.org.uk.
3. People can also contact a range of 'not-for-profit' organisations for free, confidential and impartial debt advice including the National Debtline on 0808 808 4000 or visit www.nationaldebtline.co.uk.
4. People can find general information about debt management and further details about the range of 'not-for-profit' organisations for free, confidential and impartial debt advice from www.directgov.uk.

[MIKE770]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

FOS be relistic? - get their arsxxx in gear and get legislation for the return of frudulent Bank charges, get it right this time - even the PM goes down on paper as saying unfair Bank Charges, people would have monies to spend or save.

[leclerc]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

Mike, the specific article was by the OFT and if you remember, they lost the test case and furthermore, if you have read the Scrivener opinion, it would be highly difficult to overturn so we either move forward or we stay in the past about what should have happened. Many asked for them to take action on bank charges and when they did ie the test case, then they were wrong anyway.
Forward looking or backward looking, each of us have to decide.

The article itself is pretty good with regards to what it says. For example, saffy's thread on the small change saving thread is one which you can put in a savings account regardless of the return and save for next Christmas since 2011 is yet again another tough year with VAT increases impacting on food prices etc, etc,

[MIKE770]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

[quote=leclerc;189666]Mike, the specific article was by the OFT and if you remember, they lost the test case and furthermore, if you have read the Scrivener opinion, it would be highly difficult to overturn so we either move forward or we stay in the past about what should have happened. Many asked for them to take action on bank charges and when they did ie the test case, then they were wrong anyway.
Forward looking or backward looking, each of us have to decide.

The article itself is pretty good with regards to what it says. For example, saffy's thread on the small change saving thread is one which you can put in a savings account regardless of the return and save for next Christmas since 2011 is yet again another tough year with VAT increases impacting on food prices etc, etc,[/quote

Indicated in my post was that they should get it right this time, the PM can get legislation through?

[leclerc]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

[quote=MIKE770;189668]

Mike, the specific article was by the OFT and if you remember, they lost the test case and furthermore, if you have read the Scrivener opinion, it would be highly difficult to overturn so we either move forward or we stay in the past about what should have happened. Many asked for them to take action on bank charges and when they did ie the test case, then they were wrong anyway.
Forward looking or backward looking, each of us have to decide.

The article itself is pretty good with regards to what it says. For example, saffy's thread on the small change saving thread is one which you can put in a savings account regardless of the return and save for next Christmas since 2011 is yet again another tough year with VAT increases impacting on food prices etc, etc,[/quote

Indicated in my post was that they should get it right this time, the PM can get legislation through?

Your post was about Bank Charges legislation and the the FOS getting legislation through--both of which are irrelevant to the article.
The article is about saving money this year to spend on Christmas presents next year. I have no idea why you have read it as a piece on Bank Charges since it is not. Perhaps you might have misread the article.

[MIKE770]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

A Bank charges refund could be converted into savings which people are having difficulty doing now, due to shortage of income, Simple!

[Sapphire]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

A Bank charges refund could be converted into savings which people are having difficulty doing now, due to shortage of income, Simple!

Actually thats a very good idea and something the David Cameron and his oppo's should consider, the whole concept makes sense and would effectively get the economy moving again.

[pompeyfaith]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

Just because the supreme court ruled against it, and the oft do not wish to take the matter further does not and never will mean they were right and us consumers are wrong.

It is just there opinion against ours and for the record I for one still think the bank charges issue was a rip off.

If the banks believe they are right tell me why my bank has caved in over a second claim for bank charges and agreed to return a further £360 indeed if they believed they were right they would be steadfast and refused to refund point blank.

[Angry Cat]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

An extremely prudent plan.
If, one is on a good salary.

Now let me try to recall the remuneration+ that John Fingleton receives;
more than our PM, I believe!

Also, with more job losses expected for 2011 and;
that the DCA Industry is cranking up the anti on their collections for next year.

One wonders, just where these savings can come from?

Not forgetting, the rise in the cost of fuel, utilities in general, the rise in the cost of postage and VAT etc...the cost of everything is going, UP!

THE MAJORITY OF US, ARE STRUGGLING TO MAKE ENDS MEET.

[leclerc]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

Just because the supreme court ruled against it, and the oft do not wish to take the matter further does not and never will mean they were right and us consumers are wrong.
Legally the banks were right as it stands today so in a black and white decision, we were wrong however, you have got to look at what was achieved rather than what was lost. We achieved a lot of change and that is important to remember.
It is just there opinion against ours and for the record I for one still think the bank charges issue was a rip off.
That's not correct. A legal judgement mean that we are wrong in the legal sense of the word. Furthermore, a bank does not have thoughts as it is an institution so please stop assuming that a bank is in any way human. I think we have achieved a lot so that many do not get bank charges and that the banks cannot simply sweep financial hardship(which may be an issue we come back to in 2011) under the table.
If the banks believe they are right tell me why my bank has caved in over a second claim for bank charges and agreed to return a further £360 indeed if they believed they were right they would be steadfast and refused to refund point blank.

I repeat the banks are not human beings so there is no thought process. Banks were caving in because their legal advice may have been such that they would lose in court. When that ceased to be the case then they refused refunds unless there was severe financial hardship. I am not sure why I bothered to take the thread back away from Bank Charges now since I kinda am taking it back to it.

[The Debt Star]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

they refused refunds unless there was severe financial hardship. .

They don't even do that.

Have just had a refusal for a refund from Barclays despite hardship appeal,,,and their charges genuinely caused hardship in our case,,,

Got a preemptory response from the bank totally ignoring what I had quoted and referred to in the Lending Code.

Is there any point mentioning this to the LSB? I think not; last time I did that Robert Skinner the CEO sent me a very nice letter but it basically said they won't investiage individual cases. And we know there's no point going to the FOS about bank charges anymore.
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If the banks believe they are right tell me why my bank has caved in over a second claim for bank charges and agreed to return a further £360 indeed if they believed they were right they would be steadfast and refused to refund point blank.

Which bank was it? and did you appeal to them on hardship grounds?

[di30]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

I have been in financial hardship myself when where hubby's steelplant where he worked went into administration, and golly that was just days before Xmas 2007, and no pay was given for many weeks, infact about 2 months after he received his first batch of the payments, and its been in dribs and drabs ever since.

Its bad enough when that happens anyway despite it just being days from Christmas.
So from then on, there was the mortgage to sort out through the insurance, then all other credit, which only lasted so long on the payouts of the insurance, and of course it was also at the time of recession, jobs were very scarce as you are aware.

Hubby did return to contract employments after that but nothing that ever lasted out, but it was better than nothing.
Its been almost a year now since he been back in full time perm employment, and we have finally sorted things out on the financial side of things, so what we did was once all priority bills were paid, food in the cupboard, anything spare we put in a jar, and amazingly we did save quite a bit, oh that was with stopping smoking as well.

We got rid of the Subaru Impreza and changed for a ford focus diesel, and we have saved no end, due to this we have managed to get my 2 sons something they wanted between them for Xmas just gone, and that was a Kinect.

I know it can be very hard and lots have been in the same position, we were absolutely devastated when that happened, and never want to go through the same thing again, even though I understand it could happen.

And I know sometimes saving can be easier said than done, but we did have to get rid of the Scooby car, miss it but a car is only really a car lol.

I think there's things we all have to sacrifice at times like this.

Just wanted to share my experience with you folks x

[leclerc]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

They don't even do that.

Have just had a refusal for a refund from Barclays despite hardship appeal,,,and their charges genuinely caused hardship in our case,,,
I know my stuff on financial hardship and I managed to get someone a 5 figure payout during the OFT test case based on financial hardship and arguing the case which most of the info is in the hardship forum on here.
Got a preemptory response from the bank totally ignoring what I had quoted and referred to in the Lending Code.
Debt, am not sure if I read the thread or whether I gave advice, I honestly cannot remember to be totally honest. There is imho a lot of advice out there and not all of it is necessarily correct(if you see the hardship guide on CAG, it was desparately out of date and was completely wrong at worst. On MSE there were many aspects to theirs that I did not agree with and made suggestions to their site team at the time.). Barclays is a tough one, because of their change in their charging structure, the reserve fees were outside yet inside the OFT test case at the time. I have always argued that the reserve should be ditched if it is causing you financial hardship since the £8 return fees and interest is more beneficial to you. I would be interested if you could link to the hardship thread on here(for simple reason that I have no idea whether it was here or elsewhere).
Is there any point mentioning this to the LSB? I think not; last time I did that Robert Skinner the CEO sent me a very nice letter but it basically said they won't investiage individual cases. And we know there's no point going to the FOS about bank charges anymore.
I don't agree with you based on financial hardship. If you see my signature I do point you to the Ombudsman news from February 2009(I think :o) which explains about what financial hardship is and what it isn't. There are people, and unfortunately Martin Lewis again in today's News of the World talks about reclaiming bank charges, who do not appear to understand that the bank can comply without even repaying a penny in bank charges and I am not suggesting your case was under that premise either.

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Which bank was it? and did you appeal to them on hardship grounds?

see above.

Di, I haven't commented on your post as such but as you know the rules around hardship changed during the FSA Waiver period and a lot of pressure was put on to clarify the way in which hardship cases should be dealt with.

[EXC]

Re: Make a resolution to save for Christmas now and avoid a financial hangover

Is there any point mentioning this to the LSB? I think not; last time I did that Robert Skinner the CEO sent me a very nice letter but it basically said they won't investiage individual cases. And we know there's no point going to the FOS about bank charges anymore.

I think it is worth mentioning to LCSB. Although it probably wouldn't help you in this case, the Lending Code is currently under review and I believe that they should be made aware of it's shortcomings.

In my view we owe it to ourselves to report non-compliance of the Lending Code. Me & Amethyst met with Robert Skinner in May when they were consulting on opt-out accounts and after I had the following dialogue with him.


Hi Robert

Thanks for taking the time to speak to us last week.

I wanted to draw your attention to a post made on one of the consumer forums yesterday which neatly demonstrates several issues we put forward to you during our meeting and in our written submission.

The post reads as follows:

''I've been here http://www.halifax.co.uk/bankaccount...reform0607.pdf and it says "If your account is overdrawn we will not be able to close the account" but the reason I want to close my account is because I am constantly in my overdraft and am fed up of incurring their ridiculous monthly charges of £1 per day! I paid £22 back last month and it's going to be £26 this month!!!!

I've already switched banks to one that doesn't charge a fee if I go into my overdraft with them and canceled all direct debits/standing orders etc with Halifax and also arranged for any money (apart from Child Benefit for now) that did go into my Halifax Account to go into my new account.

But surely I must be legally allowed to close my Halifax Account and pay them the money I owe on a monthly basis (as I can't afford to pay back the full overdraft yet) by paying x amount of pounds back per month until the outstanding balance is cleared, because surely they can't turn round and say sorry you can't close your account because I'm overdrawn and then every month bang on more and more monthly charges until I owe them thousands!

Because if I can't close the account and have them agree to me paying back what I owe on a monthly basis I'm NEVER going to not owe them money and surely that's not legal? Because if it is then their basically saying YOU owe us money and YOU can't close your account till we get every penny back and until we get every penny back we WILL keep charging you *****loads of money until you pay back what you owe!!

Advice please''

In comparison to many others we see, the above example is relatively tame as the fees relate to an arranged overdraft facility. But as such time as the fees take the account into unauthorized overdraft the fees increase exponentially and without limitation. There is technically nothing to prevent banks from locking a customer into an account - against their wishes - and continually applying fees indefinitely and it is this situation that is responsible for many of the larger debts caused by insufficient funds charges that we see.


That fact that you cannot close (and therefore switch) an account to avoid fees when in debit is not just a feature of Halifax but all PCA providers and this severely inhibits the notion that simply moving to an opt-out account genuinely offers consumers the ability to avoid fees. It also supports our view that fees should be billed for separately, rather than being deducted from the account, certainly at the point the customer wishes to terminate their account.

In short, having the ability to switch to an opt-out account can only work if it is accompanied by the ability to opt-out of the existing account.

We'd be grateful to hear your views on this.


Kind regards

Nick

Nick, thanks for copying me in on the forum post to illustrate some of the points that you raised when we spoke.

I don’t feel I can comment on a specific case but as a general point if a customer is experiencing financial difficulties, as may be the case here, then the Lending Code, as I’m sure you are aware, provides that where subscribers see customers who appear to be heading into financial difficulties, they should make pro-active contact and seek to help them. One outcome of the dialogue between the customer and the bank could be the customer being allowed to make repayments against an agreed plan and with no excess charges being made. As ever we would encourage an early dialogue between the customer and their bank.

Thank you again for your feedback.

Kind regards

Robert