£60 for a bounced DD?!

[leclerc]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

Satan-der have refused to reimburse the £45 a pop charges. Total £320 over 24 month period. They say their charges are FOS approved.

So I have now replied to Satan-der as follows.

Mr Plagueis
Complaints Handler
Santander Customer Finance
3 Princess Way
REDHILL
Surrey
RH1 1SR

Dear Mr Plagueis


Agreement Number: 1234456789

I write in connection with the above.

Your response was peremptory and you have not considered the merits of my complaint. It is my belief that the charges are disproportionate, excessive and unfair as they amount to a de-facto charge of £45.00 per late payment.

I request that you reconsider your decision not to reimburse me the charges applied to my account since its inception. You will therefore regard this as an escalated complaint.

While you have invited me to appeal to the Financial Ombudsman, you have done so without being fully aware of my personal financial circumstances and the effect that the bank’s charges have had. You also appear to be unaware of the Financial Services Authority (FSA) guidance and the Office for Unfair Trading (OFT) guidance on unfair charges. The OFT has published guidelines saying that £12.00 was the maximum they would expect but that NO charges are valid until the true administration costs are provided.

Please provide me with a full breakdown of the costs you have incurred as a result of my breaches, in order to prove to me that your penalties really do reflect your actual losses.

The OFT report of 2006 concluded that excessive charges are unfair to the consumer. The FSA agree and regard such charges as highly unfair in reference to the Unfair Terms in consumer Contracts Regulations (the Regulations). Therefore a charge of £45 is unlikely to be enforceable against consumers. Schedule 2 to the Regulations states that an unfair contract term specifically INCLUDES:


“consumers being subject to unfair penalties.”

This is a current regulation. With respect, it has nothing to do with whether you think the Financial Ombudsman (FOS) agrees that your £45 charges are fair because if this complaint escalates further I will report to the FSA, the OFT as well as the FOS.

Insofar as the effect of your charges upon me, I would state that they have caused me financial distress and hardship. I have little personal income and joint household income is barely enough to cover basic living expenses after the payment of essential bills and existing debts. Your bank taking over £320.00 on a two year period has put me into a position of further hardship.

Section 9 of The Lending Code states that a refund of charges could be agreed if the charges themselves are reducing my household income to a level where I am unable to pay essential outgoings as they become due. Often Santander’s charges have caused financial hardship.

I would also like to draw your attention to guidance issued by The Lending Standards Board:


“If, during the course of a customer’s account operation, a subscriber becomes aware via their existing systems that the customer may be heading towards financial difficulties, the subscriber should contact the customer to outline their approach to financial difficulties and to encourage the customer to contact the subscriber if the customer is worried about their position. Subscribers should also provide signposts to sources of free, independent money advice.”


Further, it is equally clear that I have been in financial difficulties and that these have been evident to you as a subscriber to the Lending Code, from one or more of the following events stipulated at paragraph 139 of the Lending Code:


“·Items repeatedly being returned unpaid due
· Failing to meet loan repayments or other commitments”


The charges incurred have made affording my essential living costs such as food, electricity and mortgagevery difficult.


I also take exception to your compulsory charge of £25.00 for changing the payment date of my direct debit so that I could try to make sure that your payments were collected without being returned by my bank, thereby reducing the financial hardshop this was causing.

Yours sincerely,


THE DEBT STAR

Debt Star, the letter is not great since it skirts around things and then uses some things that may not necessarily be relevant.
Are we talking the loan account or bank charges?
Financial hardship is unlikely to be something you can really rely on with the loan account but can be with bank charges. Furthermore, have you read the actual report on Credit card default fees from April 2006?(for reference it's OFT842).

The bit you quote from the OFT842 report is section 3.3 which states this in context:

" Schedule 2 to the UTCCRs illustrates possible respects in which a term may be unfair to the consumer by means of a 'grey list' of possible kinds of unfairness. Of particular relevance to default charges is paragraph 1(e) of Schedule 2, specifying terms that have the object or effect of requiring any consumer who fails to fulfil his obligation to pay a disproportionately high sum in compensation"
You will note that they do not say that they are unfair but maybe unfair since they are talking about the contract as a whole. Not every term that is unfair will necessarily mean that the whole contract is unfair.

I would have gone with a different paragraph.

"1.14 It must be stressed that this is a statement of our position and reflects the exercise of our discretion as an enforcement agency. Only a court can decide finally whether a term is unfair, or at what level default charges should be set to meet the requirements of the UTCCRs. It should be kept in mind that other enforcers may apply for injunctions under the UTCCRs and that the UTCCRs may be relied upon by consumers in private claims."

The lending code also states that you have a responsibility as well to tell the lender if you believe you are suffering financial hardship and is not simply that the lender should assume that someone is suffering financial hardship.
Paragraph 137 specifically at the start of section 9 states this:

"137. Subscribers should be sympathetic and positive when considering a customer’s financial difficulties. Although there is
an onus on customers to try to help themselves, the first step, when a subscriber becomes aware of a customer’s
financial difficulties, should be to try to contact the customer to discuss the matter. This applies to both personal and
micro-enterprise customers."

[The Debt Star]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

Loan account.

But had to have a stab as I couldn't find a precedent anywhere. So adapted the credit card charges one.

Your advice will come in handy for my third and final attempt before I kick this off to the FOS. Unless, that is, I can't complain to the FOS about loan account charges? Not sure anymore....:tinysmile_hmm_t2:

[leclerc]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

Loan account.

But had to have a stab as I couldn't find a precedent anywhere. So adapted the credit card charges one.

Your advice will come in handy for my third and final attempt before I kick this off to the FOS. Unless, that is, I can't complain to the FOS about loan account charges? Not sure anymore....:tinysmile_hmm_t2:

Am gonna check with amethyst cos there is a legal case where loan charges were said to be permissable. Just need to check if I have remembered that well and furthermore whether it would have a bearing.

[The Debt Star]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

Am gonna check with amethyst cos there is a legal case where loan charges were said to be permissable. Just need to check if I have remembered that well and furthermore whether it would have a bearing.

cheers mate. that could save me loadsa time and grief.

[Amethyst]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

I don't think there has been a legal case ref loan charges, there has of course been Brandon v Amex which says credit card charges are fine, but loan charges, you might be thinking of the FSA undertakings with lenders like Kensignton and GMAC -- theres info in the announcements section of the site on those. They said late payment fees were okay, but people are receiving refunds using the credit card arguments (as they are penalties) and the lenders really don't want it testing in court as it would cost them millions.

[Amethyst]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

£45 late payment fees on loans that are FOS approved ??????? is that what santander told you ? If so that needs some investigation - it may be that one person put a complaint in through FOS and the bank won..... but FOS approved my backside.

[The Debt Star]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

£45 late payment fees on loans that are FOS approved ??????? is that what santander told you ? If so that needs some investigation - it may be that one person put a complaint in through FOS and the bank won..... but FOS approved my backside.

well precisely what I thought. hence my second letter but with hardship thrown in for good measure. they will of course resist my claim and knowing santander will probably ignore my second letter. On the basis that £45 charges are excessive I will then appeal to the FOS.

[pallaz1851]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

To all above, For what it is worth I have been through 'hell and back' with Banks over various issues. I can catagorically state that the Banks (collective) no longer view you as a 'Customer' you are purely a 'Commodity' to be screwed till the pips squeak and then some!! you will be passed from desk to desk within the Ban k providing that it is able to be charged to YOU!
I no longer have ANY DD's....this is a total 'ploy' dreampt up in a back room of the marketing departments of Banks (collective) as a way to put 'Added value' for them onto your account....life is and never will be as regimented as DD's require from you....so, where I have to implement payments for something where they insist the ONLY way is a DD, I sign the forms....I let the first payment go through and then cancel.....I require in the meantime from the lender/bank/finance company...whoever their Bank payment details and I do it online direct to their account speed payment it is there within 2 hours and recorded to them as coming from me and my account number........THEY DO NOT LIKE IT AT ALL......THEY SAY IT BUGGERS UP THEIR SYSTEMS, i ARGUE THAT THIS WAY IT LEAVES no ERROR FOR THE PAYMENT not GETTING TO THEM....and I have a permanent record.....wonderful!!! I do not speak with their call centres, why talk to the monkeys with no authority at all, when you can bypass the system completely......ALL YOU MUST DO THOUGH IS NOT MISS A PAYMENT....BUT YOU CAN DO IT ON YOUR OWN TIME.....Sod em'
Hope this helps...

Pallaz 1851 (militant)

[leclerc]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

To all above, For what it is worth I have been through 'hell and back' with Banks over various issues. I can catagorically state that the Banks (collective) no longer view you as a 'Customer' you are purely a 'Commodity' to be screwed till the pips squeak and then some!! you will be passed from desk to desk within the Ban k providing that it is able to be charged to YOU!
That is not the case. People always try to help you who work for banks but are constrained by two things contradicting each other which will lead to the consequences. If you work for a bank you want to help and sometimes you can see that certain things are not right however, at the top level of the bank, they have policies which, and I agree with the commodity bit, mean you are in a straight jacket. Either follow the policy or lose your job. Which one would you do?


I no longer have ANY DD's....this is a total 'ploy' dreampt up in a back room of the marketing departments of Banks (collective) as a way to put 'Added value' for them onto your account....life is and never will be as regimented as DD's require from you....so, where I have to implement payments for something where they insist the ONLY way is a DD, I sign the forms....I let the first payment go through and then cancel.....I require in the meantime from the lender/bank/finance company...whoever their Bank payment details and I do it online direct to their account speed payment it is there within 2 hours and recorded to them as coming from me and my account number........THEY DO NOT LIKE IT AT ALL......THEY SAY IT BUGGERS UP THEIR SYSTEMS, i ARGUE THAT THIS WAY IT LEAVES no ERROR FOR THE PAYMENT not GETTING TO THEM....
Direct Debits were mostly designed for ease rather than for any other reason. I do commend you for what you have done. Can I ask if you have ever had any problems with the Direct Debits being reset up on the account once you have cancelled it and set up Standing Orders/direct payments?


and I have a permanent record.....wonderful!!! I do not speak with their call centres, why talk to the monkeys with no authority at all, when you can bypass the system completely......ALL YOU MUST DO THOUGH IS NOT MISS A PAYMENT....BUT YOU CAN DO IT ON YOUR OWN TIME.....Sod em'
Hope this helps...
I would agree with you on the call centres and some of them that work there simply were not born with the brains they were given albeit not all of them, lol!
Pallaz 1851 (militant)

See above and I could have guessed the militant bit, btw.

[pallaz1851]

Re: £60 for a bounced DD?!

leclerk, (Either follow the policy or lose your job. Which one would you do?)

I accept totally the position you are/were in as an employee, however, due to the 'policies' and constraints, plus the fact that it is impossible for a 'customer/commodity' to get his point over directly to the person/persons making the contrary decisions, total frustration overtakes ALL parties, you being the recipient of the forthcoming 'anger' stemming from the futility that the 'customer' is pushed into. lol

(Can I ask if you have ever had any problems with the Direct Debits being reset up on the account once you have cancelled it and set up Standing Orders/direct payments?)

No, the question here is am I giving them the 'high ground' by not meeting my obligations. No, I do not miss any payments at all, they are just within the month, ON MY TERMS. from this they are 'stuffed' - what can they complain about, they get the money directly into their accounts within 2 hours of leaving mine, their systems (paper) mean that they are never in front of me, it is the call centres which they wish to use, I have an answerphone screening all calls to me, I do not reply to their requests in the meantime the monies are in their account.....finality!!! lol