lioness v HSBC charges back to 1993 & compound interest * Settled *

**lioness** · 21st May 2007, 13:24:PM

continued from post 1

On 27/2/2007 DG wrote to me enclosing an amended defence which they asked for my consent to, to save the costs of the hearing. The amended defence stated that parts of my claim (+6 years and contractual interest) should be struck out - because it was statute barred and I had no entitlement to contractual interest. (the cheek of it LOL!!)

They also claimed I had no entitlement to claim the overdraft interest that related to the overdraft caused by the penalty charges.

They wanted my consent within 7 days but during that time I had a bad case of flu and couldn't deal with it. On the 7th day there was a knock on my door and lo and behold there was the HSBC court bundle! They had made an application for permission to serve their amended defence, to be listed at the same hearing.

On 12/3/2007 I wrote a very long letter to the court saying why the amended defence was an abuse of process, why they should not be given permission to serve it, and why I was entitled to a full hearing of my claim, including charges older than 6 years. I sent a copy to DG.

That letter is pasted below. It hasn't pasted very well because the original did have numbered paragraphs but you'll get the gist of it.

**lioness** · 21st May 2007, 13:28:PM

continued from post 2

I refer to the above matter and should be grateful if you would bring this letter to the attention of the District Judge in readiness for my hearing this coming Friday at 10:30.

I am in receipt of notice of the defendant’s application seeking leave to amend its defence, and witness statement in support, which I am given to understand will be listed at the hearing of my application to strike out the defence.

My comments in relation to the Amended Defence and Witness Statement are below. For the avoidance of any doubt, this is not to be taken as a reply to the defence; my comments are pertinent only to the defendant’s request for leave to serve the Amended Defence.

The Amended Defence

I have no objection to the defendant being granted leave to amend its defence, however, I respectfully submit that the court should not grant leave to the defendant to amend its defence in the terms proposed, on the following grounds:

1. The Amended Defence (at paragraphs 4, 6, 7, sub para 7.1, 8 and 9), does not meet the requirements of the CPR, because it consists of bare denials and does not state the defendant’s reasons for denying the claimant’s allegations or its own version of events as required by CPR 16.5 (2) (a) and (b) and CPR 16.5 (6) (a) and (b). Consequently if the Amended Defence is permitted to stand, the claimant will be unable to plead a response to the defendant’s denials.

2. With regard to paragraph 1 of the Amended Defence, the claimant is not aware of any reason, and the defendant has failed to give any explanation, as to why the defendant did not take action to apply to have the claim (or parts of the claim) struck out before or when submitting its Allocation Questionnaire. The claimant deems that the defendant had sufficient time and opportunity to decide what action to take before this advanced stage of the proceedings, more than 2 months after allocation.

3. The claimant’s complaint was that the defence originally entered was pled in such a vague manner as to show no genuine knowledge of its contract with the claimant or the transactions in dispute, and contained information that had no relevance to the claim. The claimant is not aware of any grounds for permitting the defendant at this stage to re-cast its defence, after having already requested a hearing of the claim, in order to assert fresh rights to apply to strike out parts of the claim. If the defendant believes it has those rights, then it was not prevented from asserting them earlier, the facts in the claim have not changed since the defendant was served with it, requested a hearing of it and expressed no desire to dispose of any part of the claim without a trial.

Had the defendant desired to make such an application the time to have made it was prior to allocation, in compliance with the following CPR Practice Directions:

a. PD 26 - case management – preliminary stage: allocation and re-allocation, para 5.3 (1)
b. PD 3 – striking out a statement of case, para 5.1
c. PD 23 - applications, para 2.7

4. It is the claimant’s opinion that the Amended Defence is an abuse of process and is likely to obstruct the just disposal of the proceedings:

The claimant is claiming charges applied to the account by the defendant between July 1993 and November 2006 on the grounds that they are deemed to amount to unenforceable penalties.

The claimant contends at Paragraph 9 of the Particulars of Claim, that the defendant concealed facts that would have led to the claimant discovering that the charges were penalties, giving rise to grounds for a deferment of the statutory limitation period pursuant to section 32 (1)(b) of the Limitations Act 1980; the defendant’s statement of case that the charges were not intended to represent loss or damage it suffered by the claimant’s account breaches is in itself evidence of the concealment of the facts because it is contradictory to the defendant’s terms and conditions which state the opposite “Clause 7.13 our overdraft review fee covers our management and administration costs”, thus the claimant believes that what was stated in the terms and conditions was untrue and amounts to a concealment of the facts. Clause 7.13 has disappeared from the defendant’s latest terms and conditions dated December 2006.

The claimant also contends at Paragraph 10 of the Particulars of Claim, that she mistakenly paid the charges, believing them not to be penalties until she discovered the concealment in 2006, giving rise to grounds for a postponement of the limitation period pursuant to section 32 (1)(c) of the Limitations Act 1980. The defendant is unable to prove otherwise, i.e. that the claimant believed and knew the charges to be penalties when she paid them. Further, the defendant’s statement of case (paragraph 7.2.2) does not deny that if the charges amounted to penalties there would be a case for the claimant to succeed with a claim under section 32 (1)(c) of the Limitations Act 1980.

The claimant acknowledges that there has been no judicial ruling on whether or not the defendant’s charges constitute an unenforceable penalty, however that in itself does not mean that the charges are not a penalty – otherwise there would never be cause to bring a case to court. The claimant is satisfied that the defendant’s charges meet the current legal definition of a penalty under the common law, and believes that her case has more than a reasonable prospect of succeeding. However, in order to succeed in her claims under Paragraphs 9 and 10 of the Particulars of Claim, the claimant recognises that she would first require a judicial ruling over whether or not the defendant’s charges amount to penalties, as these two contentions are dependant on this fact having been proven in court.

By seeking to have Paragraphs 9 and 10 of the Particulars of Claim struck out (an intention expressed in Paragraph 7 of the Amended Defence) before there has been a determination on the issue of whether the charges constitute a penalty, the Amended Defence, if permitted, will effectively prejudice the claimant’s case.

It is also the claimant’s belief that the defendant, if it succeeded in having that part of the claim struck out, would then offer to settle the remainder of the charges out of court to avoid a judgement on the charges. This is not speculative; the claimant has already received and rejected an offer from the defendant to refund only the charges applied in the 6 years prior to the issue of the claim form. It is the claimant’s belief that this is not therefore a defence that the defendant is genuinely proposing to rely on to resist the claim at trial and that is not a valid reason for entering a defence. If there is any doubt then the claimant appeals to the court’s over-riding objective to ensure that the case is dealt with fairly and asks the court to consider whether the defence is an abuse of process. The claimant would also ask the court to consider in relation to this, the fact that the defendant has failed to defend any claim at a hearing. A list of cases settled out of court and a list of cases defended at a hearing will satisfy the court that this is the case.

Alternatively, the claimant respectfully submits that any application to strike out parts of the claim that is heard before a trial of the whole claim would be an obstruction to the just disposal of the proceedings because the claimant will be denied a determination of the defendant’s full liability to her. If the Amended Defence, or any subsequent Amended defence in similar terms, is permitted to be served, the claimant requests the court to consider making an order under CPR 3.1 (2) (j), that Paragraph 7 of the claim be determined at the same hearing but prior to hearing any application by the defendant to strike out parts of the claim. This will not prejudice the case of the defendant because it will provide a fair hearing of the claim, a claim which it claims to be intending to defend at trial in any event, and it will still allow for parts of the claim to be struck out or lost if that is the outcome of the hearing.

The Witness Statement of DMD

The claimant avers that this Witness Statement is intended to mislead the court because it contains many inaccuracies. Most significantly it deceptively claims at Paragraph 11 that “no prejudice will be caused to the claimant by permitting the defendant to amend in the terms proposed”. This is simply not the case, as the claimant has already sought to outline for the court at Paragraph 4 of this letter.

continued in next post

**lioness** · 21st May 2007, 13:33:PM

continued from post 3

5. At Paragraph 6.1 of the witness statement the defendant asserts its entitlement to “make a charge for its services…including an overdraft fee for considering whether to provide and providing an overdraft”. The claimant does not concur with this view; the charges were not representative of any service provided by the defendant, they were penalties applied “in terrorem” of the claimant. As an example, the defendant applied ten charges in October 2004 totalling £192.

Six of the ten charges (described on the statement as “CHARGE CARD MISUSE”) were in respect of cheques that caused the account to go over its overdraft limit but being guaranteed by a cheque card the defendant was unable to return them unpaid. The claimant has no idea what service the defendant performed for £192. It was not considering or agreeing to an extended overdraft because the defendant was bound to honour the cheques in any event, and in any case its terms and conditions stated that “Clause 7.16 …If we do pay the cheque, other item or card transaction and your account goes overdrawn or over any agreed overdraft limit, this does not mean that we have agreed an overdraft or increased limit”. The claimant presumes that the single computer-generated and computer-signed letter sent to the claimant by the defendant, advising of the charges is not the defendant’s justification for applying the charges and did not cost the defendant £192 to produce in any event. The claimant is unable to give credit in her claim to the defendant for the actual costs or losses actually incurred in producing this letter, because the defendant has refused to provide evidence of any costs as requested.

In July 2006 the defendant applied nine charges totalling £225, again this involved four cheques that were guaranteed by cheque card and so could not be returned unpaid.

Thus the claimant will demonstrate in her case when it proceeds to trial that the defendant’s unreasonable and unconscionable charges are merely unenforceable penalty charges and that the defendant has concealed and continues to conceal the true nature of them. Since December 2006 the claimant has noted that the defendant has removed clause 7.16 from its terms and conditions and has introduced a new term for a payment issued that causes the account to go over its overdraft limit. This is now referred to as an “informal overdraft request” in order to justify the appearance that a service is being provided. These are the same charges but under a different guise. The claimant believes that this is in response to an unprecedented number of claims against the defendant over the past 12 months for refunds of its unlawful penalty charges.

6. At Paragraph 6.2 of the witness statement the defendant has admitted knowledge of some of the charges paid by the claimant, yet in the Amended Defence the defendant makes no admission as to the value of charges paid. The claimant will provide her own evidence of the charges in the schedule as directed by the court. The claimant is surprised in an age of electronic banking that the defendant does not archive its customers’ transactional history in any event, and wonders whether the defendant considers whether the records it holds on microfiche are not a relevant filing system.

7. At Paragraph 6.3 of the witness statement the defendant tries to make the case that the claimant has no valid grounds for claiming the overdraft interest that is claimed. This is to misconceive the grounds of the claim. The defendant’s statement that “the charges were, at any one time, a very small part [of the claimant’s overdraft borrowing]” demonstrates that the defendant has fundamentally misunderstood the basis of the claimant’s claim for overdraft interest. If one is overdrawn by say £1,000 and the cumulative charges taken at that point totalled £1,500, the effect will be that had the charges not been taken the account would not have been overdrawn at all. It is immaterial that the latest charge or even the latest couple of charges only formed a very small part of the overdraft borrowing – it is the cumulative effect of the charges that matters. The claimant’s claim for overdraft interest has been meticulously calculated and double checked to ensure that it only ever relates to the cumulative charges within the overdrawn balance of account at the point that the overdraft interest was debited. Mostly this means that all overdraft interest has been claimed, and validly so, and on other occasions this means that only an apportionment or fraction of the interest is appropriate, and the schedule to the claim reflects this. The claimant can show that had the charges not been applied, the account would have been consistently in credit since 25 July 2004 (for 2 years and 4 months leading up to the issue of the claim). Therefore no overdraft interest is justifiable or should have been applied because the account would not have been overdrawn. Prior to that date only an apportionment of the interest debited has been claimed, with two exceptions – those being the periods 3/9/2001 to 3/2/2002 and 3/9/2002 to 3/10/2003, when the charges exceeded the average overdrawn balances in the relevant months.

8. At Paragraph 7.1 of the witness statement the claimant does not concur with the defendant’s contention that the charges were not penalties and were not payable on breach.

The claimant’s case in relation to the defendant’s assertion that the charges are not penalties is outlined at Paragraph 5 of this letter. The question remains to be answered as to whether the charges were payable upon breach of contract:

The following extracts are quoted from the defendant’s terms and conditions: -

Clause 5.1.1 “you must only write a cheque if there are cleared funds in the account, or an agreed overdraft to cover it.”

Clause 7.3 “you must keep your bank account in credit unless we have agreed an overdraft.”

Clause 7.4 “we will give you a letter setting out the terms of any agreed overdraft. You must stay within the agreed limit.”

The claimant has always understood the definition of a breach of contract to be a failure to do something that is required in a contract and that, by issuing a payment when there was no agreed overdraft to cover it, she was in fact breaching the above contract terms. The claimant further holds that clause 7.13 of the terms and conditions (“our...[charge] covers our management and administration costs”) provides for a pre-determined specified sum of money to be payable by the claimant following a breach of the contract – in other words it is a liquidated damages clause. The law requires that the liquidated damages sum must be a genuine pre-estimate of the loss or damages incurred by the defendant. If it is not then the term will be construed as penal, and as a penalty clause, it will not be enforced by the courts. The claimant contends that in order for the defendant to successfully defend the claim it will need to disclose how the liquidated damages sum was calculated. Otherwise the claimant’s case will be to show how, on the balance of probabilities, the charges could not have been a genuine pre-estimate of the damage suffered by the defendant upon the account breaches. The claimant will start with a comparison of the defendant’s charge of £10 for stopping a cheque, and the manual work involved in that process i.e. retrieving the cheque and processing the transactions, against the work of examining a guaranteed cheque which takes the account over its overdraft limit, and which is not even returned unpaid, and does not involve the defendant in considering whether to pay the item, for which the defendant charges £30.

continued in next post

**lioness** · 21st May 2007, 13:36:PM

continued from post 4

9. As to Paragraph 7.2 of the witness statement, the claimant is under no misconception about the effect of Section 4 of the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977. The charges were imposed by reason of the claimant’s breaches of contract and clause 7.13 of the terms and conditions is a liquidated damages clause. The terms and conditions which the defendant professes entitle it to charge unconscionable amounts in the event of account breaches are not reasonable terms considering that loss or damage suffered by the defendant in July 2006, for example, could not reasonably have been £225 when the only evidence of cost is a single computer generated letter from the defendant, which might have cost £1 to generate with a high street mark up, asking the claimant to stop issuing cheques until the account was brought back to within its overdraft limit. It should be noted that the charges caused the claimant considerable financial hardship, being a lone parent on a very low income with three children to support, and as such she was forced to remain over her overdraft limit in order to meet everyday living costs and consequently incurred another £200 of charges in the following two months. The defendant states that the term satisfies the requirement of reasonableness and is required to show that it does, pursuant to section 11 (5) of the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977. The claimant believes this requires the defendant to do more than merely make a statement that it does.

10. As to Paragraph 7.3 of the witness statement the claimant has not misplaced the effect of section 15 of the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982. The claimant does not concur with the defendant’s view that an implied term was not capable of arising or arose. S.15 of the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982 stipulates that such a term is implied in any contract where consideration for services is left to be determined by the contract. The fact that the defendant’s prices fluctuate from time to time as the defendant sees fit to increase its prices means that the consideration is left to be determined in a manner agreed by the contract – i.e. as and when the defendant periodically reviews its price list. The claimant has therefore only contracted to pay a reasonable charge. The case as to whether the charge was reasonable or not can only be determined by reference to the actual costs or losses incurred by the defendant. As the defendant has not provided these details and may claim that it is under no duty to reveal this information, the claimant has to refer the matter to the court to determine whether a charge of £30 for example is reasonable for examining a cheque to see whether it is supported by a cheque card and deciding that the defendant is bound to honour it.

11. As to Paragraphs 8, 8.1 and 8.2 of the witness statement, the claimant wishes to repeat Paragraph 4 of this letter.

The claimant wishes to make it clear that it is the defendant and not the claimant who recognises the difficulties it faces. If the claim were to proceed to a hearing, completely in tact, the claimant believes that she has a more than reasonable prospect of succeeding with her claims under section 32 of the Limitations Act 1980. The defendant recognises this, which is why it is now seeking leave to amend its defence to enable an application to take place to have this part of the claim struck out before there has been any judicial determination of whether the charges constitute a penalty.

continued in next post

**lioness** · 21st May 2007, 13:38:PM

continued from post 5

12. As to Paragraph 9 of the witness statement, the defendant asserts that there is no valid basis for the claimant to claim compound interest at 15.9%.

The claimant notes that Paragraph 8 of the Amended Defence, which purports to deal with this aspect of the claim, does not give a reason for the defendant’s denial of the claim.

The claimant contends that this aspect of her claim should not be determined until there has been a judicial ruling on the lawfulness of the defendant’s charges. The claimant acknowledges that the terms of the contract only provide for the defendant to charge and receive compound interest on monies the claimant borrows from the defendant. The claimant’s case for claiming interest at the rate applied by the defendant to the claimant’s borrowing, is based in equity and a legal requirement for fairness and balance:

a. When entering into the contract with the defendant, the claimant had no reason to anticipate that the defendant, having a long-established reputation in the banking industry, would make unlawful deductions from her account. Had this been a foreseeable event, the claimant might well have taken a different view about whether to agree to a contract which did not provide the claimant with a mutual right to charge the defendant interest in the event that monies were wrongly taken from her account, over a considerable number of years, thus producing a false picture of the claimant’s indebtedness to the defendant over the entire period covered by the claim, and unjustly enriching the defendant at the same time.

b. The claimant’s case is not that the contract should provide for the claimant to be entitled to charge interest at the rate which the defendant reserves for itself in the ordinary everyday course of dealings. The claimant is inviting the court to award interest and therefore compensate the claimant at the same rate that the defendant deems fair compensation for allowing the claimant to use its money, given that the defendant’s withdrawals from the claimant’s account were unlawful, and given that unlawful withdrawals were unforeseeable at the time of the entering into the contract.

c. If the defendant avers that its charges are fair, reasonable and therefore enforceable, its remedy will be to provide evidence of its actual losses or pre-estimate of costs in relation to the claimant’s account breaches. Since the defendant has been invited to do so prior to the issue of court proceedings, and has refused, and since the claimant is aware that the defendant has failed to defend any other similar claim at trial, the claimant deems the defendant’s charges to the account to be indefensible, and unenforceable at law. It was clearly not in the claimant’s contemplation when entering into the contract, that the claimant would authorise the defendant to apply penalty charges to the account, or to profit in an unlawful manner from the claimant’s account breaches.

d. It should also be noted that the claimant had no bargaining power to determine the terms of the contract and as all banks trade in similar terms, the claimant had no effective choice in the matter.

e. For the contract to confer advantageous terms (i.e. entitlement to compensation) on one party (the defendant) where there is no comparable term in favour of the other party (the claimant) is to create an imbalance in the parties’ rights and is contrary to the requirements of Regulation 5 (1) of the Unfair Terms In Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 (“UTCCR”).

Regulation 5 (1) of the UTCCR states as follows:

“Unfair Terms
5. – (1) A contractual term which has not been individually negotiated shall be regarded as unfair if, contrary to the requirement of good faith, it causes a significant imbalance in the parties’ rights and obligations arising under the contract, to the detriment of the consumer.”

Therefore, to satisfy the requirement of fairness within the definition given by the UTCCR, the contract should provide a mutual or reciprocal term permitting the customer to apply the same rate of interest on any unauthorised withdrawals from the customer’s account by the bank. The interest claimed is therefore deemed to provide an equitable remedy in the context of the claim.

f. The claimant’s claim for compound interest should be viewed in the context of the claim rather than in isolation, and with full regard for the seriousness of the defendant’s misdemeanours which have led to the defendant profiting unlawfully from the claimant’s account defaults. It is entirely inequitable that the defendant should have deprived the claimant of the use of her monies for this length of time without repaying it with interest at the rate which it charges the claimant in equivalent circumstances; monies which it is in the business of re-lending at the same commercial rate of interest and which will only restore the defendant to the position where it had not received any benefit from having had use of the claimant’s money.

continued in next post

**lioness** · 21st May 2007, 13:40:PM

continued from post 6

13. At Paragraph 10 of the witness statement the defendant has denied the claimant’s assertion, in her application for summary disposal of the claim, that the defendant will almost certainly settle for the full amount anyway prior to trial.

The defendant has expressed its intentions, in its Amended Defence, to apply to have the claimant’s claim for charges imposed more than 6 years before the issue of the claim struck out. As already stated at Paragraph 4 of this letter, the claimant believes that this is not a genuine defence to the claim that the defendant’s charges are penalties. The defendant is hoping to get a ruling that part of the claim is statute barred so that it can proceed to settle the remainder of the claim for charges. This is not speculation, as has already been stated elsewhere in this letter, the defendant has already offered to settle that part of the claim and the claimant has rejected the offer. As the claimant is hoping that the court will see that it is fair to make a determination as to whether the charges are penalties, prior to assessing whether the claimant has grounds for a claim under section 32 of the Limitations Act 1980, the claimant has grounds for speculating that the defendant will settle that portion of the claim out of court, with no admission as to liability, to avoid having a ruling on its charges.

As to the claim for overdraft interest caused by the charges, which forms part of the principal claim, and the claimant’s claim for compound interest, the claimant does not know whether the defendant will agree to settle this without a court’s judgement on the claim, but given that the claimant has no reason to believe that the court will find against the claimant, she can only speculate at this stage that the defendant will agree to settle the claim in full out of court.

14. At Paragraph 11 of the witness statement, the defendant contends that it has a strong and compelling defence to the claim. The defendant has not given any explanation for not having put in an adequate defence to the claim. The claimant has already commented above as to the Amended Defence not meeting the requirements of the CPR, but notwithstanding this, the claimant does not believe that the defendant will proceed to trial on the strength of its Amended Defence in any event, given its history of settling claims out of court. The claimant contends that the defence is an attempt to obstruct the just disposal of the proceedings as already outlined in Paragraph 4 of this letter. The claimant will defer to the judgement of the court as to whether there are grounds for striking out the defence.

On 27 February 2007 the defendant wrote to the claimant enclosing a copy of the draft Amended Defence, inviting her agreement to it. The claimant did not respond because she was ill at the time with severe flu and could not apply herself to the task required of her, within the time that was available. The claimant wishes to point out that the defendant has had two months in which to have prepared an Amended Defence but instead has elected to wait until two weeks before the hearing to make contact with the claimant. There is nothing the claimant could have done in all the circumstances to ensure that the hearing could have been avoided. The claimant believes that there are grounds for the defence and the Amended Defence to be struck out and requests that the claimant’s costs of the application be paid by the defendant.

The defendant states as follows “If the application to amend the defence is not permitted, with the claim being summarily disposed of, the defendant will suffer severe and irreparable prejudice.”

It has not been explained, and I am not aware of the context in which this statement is made. The defendant is represented by a solicitor and has had ample opportunity to construct a defence that complies with the CPR. If judgement is made on the claim it does not set a precedent in the County Court so it does not open the door to other claims. The claim is for just under £6,000 including interest and costs. The defendant has declared profits in the region of £11.5 billion for 2006. Payment of the claim will not cause financial hardship to the defendant. I am sure the defendant will say it is because it has a valid defence to the claim and an entitlement to defend it. If that is the case it has had since 22 November 2006 (almost 4 months) to put forward a defence that is not flawed.

15. As to Paragraph 12 of the witness statement, the claimant does not agree that the court should grant permission to the defendant to amend its defence in the terms of the proposed draft.

The claimant’s application should not be dismissed and the claimant invites the court to award summary judgement on the claim in favour of the claimant.

Alternatively, the claimant concurs that the defendant be given leave to submit an adequate defence, if the court believes that the defendant has a reasonable prospect of defending the claim and will proceed to a trial. In that instance, the claimant respectfully requests that the court, notwithstanding allocation to the small claims track, orders standard disclosure to assist in the just disposal of the claim. The claimant understands that it is within the court’s discretion to do so and believes that this would bring a rapid conclusion to this litigation.

Yours faithfully

end of letter!

case summary continued in next post

**lioness** · 21st May 2007, 13:41:PM

continued from post 7

On 14/3/2007 (2 days before the hearing) DG emailed me an offer of £4200. This was all charges back to 1993, all overdraft interest, court costs and, weirdly, 8% on the whole total multiplied by 6 years. Anyone who knows anything about county court interest knows that it isnt worked out like that - it is worked out on each charge separately for the length of time it has been outstanding. Their calculation worked out to be about £300 more than simple statutory interest on each charge since 1993.

I emailed back to say I wanted a bit more interest to settle, otherwise I would be going to court. They then upped the offer to what I had asked for £4407!! It wasn't the 15.9% I had originally asked for but it worked out to 9.34% compound interest since 1993 so I was delighted with it.

I was a bit nervous that if it went to court and the judge didnt award me the 15.9% I would end up with less than they had offered. In hindsight I would say I was in a much stronger position than I realised at the time and had I taken a bit more time to think it over I think I would have pressed for the full amount. Not because I was that confident of getting a judgement in my favour but because I truly think they would have paid it to avoid going to court. They seemed pretty desparate to avoid it.

The money was deposited in my account before midnight!!

I wish you all every success!!!

Don't restrict your claim to just 6 years. Sock it to em!!

**willowb** · 22nd May 2007, 14:39:PM

you big show off!:rolleyes:

Wxxx

**lioness** · 22nd May 2007, 15:00:PM

I know

modesty was never one of my better qualities!!

pmsl..

**Moog** · 23rd May 2007, 18:21:PM

Can you remind me lioness, which case law you used for the 6+ year charges and did you rely on concealment, mistake of fact or both?

I should remember (or have made a note before "handing in my resignation" ) but, I didn't I am afraid.

**willowb** · 24th May 2007, 12:59:PM

I'm miffed about that also, I thought I'd taken all I needed but left quite a bit really.....oh well!

Wxxx

**lioness** · 5th June 2007, 10:03:AM

Originally posted by Moog View Post

Can you remind me lioness, which case law you used for the 6+ year charges and did you rely on concealment, mistake of fact or both?

I should remember (or have made a note before "handing in my resignation" ) but, I didn't I am afraid.

sorry for taking so long to reply to you moog!

I was relying on their concealment of the true costs of the account breaches and also my mistake in believing the charges to be based on their true costs when I paid them.

There wasn't a requirement to submit court bundles for this hearing because it was my application to have the defence struck out, but having said that I was planning to spend those last 2 days before the hearing printing off bundles of anything and everything I might have needed to refer to in court. So the honest answer is I hadn't got that far and the offer came through in the nick of time.

Two cases that are relevant to limitations are -

Kleinwort Benson v Lincoln City Council

Cave v Robinson

I'll see what else I can find.

**Celestine** · 5th June 2007, 15:56:PM

Wowser!! I'm impressed with your arguments. A great result, well done!!

**Moog** · 5th June 2007, 16:35:PM

Thanks Lioness and no apologies necessary

lioness v HSBC charges back to 1993 & compound interest * Settled *

lioness v HSBC charges back to 1993 & compound interest * Settled *

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