outspoken vs abbey - *** SUCCESS ******

[bloomingflower]

Re: outspoken V abbey

So at present you have claims with include
A: the Charges
B: Contractural Interest @ 28.7%
C: Statutory Interst @ 8%

Are you saying that you want to work out the total claims with just the 8% interest and not the 28.7%
If so, just use the basic spreadsheet and it will calculate that.

What was the reason for splitting all these claims up? I am presuming they all relate to the same account.

Its up to you what interest rate to use, I dont advocate contractural rate, but others do.
Do you know allthe arguements for this, if you had to persuade a judge?

If you have filled at court, I would want any court fees and stat interst paid if they want to settle prior to the case being heard

If you want to change figures so that they will settle on that basis only, I think you will fail as there is no reason for the bank to do so as case are stayed.

I think you need to rethink at what you are trying to achieve here, as it seems to are just trying every route posible to get the money.

If you are in Hardship, stick to that and produce the reasons to to bank.

If you start chopping and changing things and giving the bank other options they will see thorugh it and you will get nowhere.

I dont want to sound harsh, but you need to be heading in one direction and not still changing your mind. Please think about what you want to do carefully
It not only confuses your own case, but makes it harder for people to advise and help you

PKea

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What was the reason for splitting all these claims up? I am presuming they all relate to the same account.
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I think I may be able to elaborate on the answer to the question above..but Outspoken has also answered in her own words too

Both myself and Outspoken (and others) had followed the same format going back over a year ago.. which was to 'split' our claims, each claim had to be for the amount of 5,000 or under , ( in other words the amount in dispute could not be more than £5,000 ) as courts will only allow this figure to be allocated to the 'small claims track'

For arguements sake..and to use as an example of.. my total of claims was 14k ( from same bank account, and this is if you are claiming the banks unauthorized rate, which is 28.7%) when I first started my claims. The advice I was given was to 'split' this into 4 claims.. so that each claim amounted to 5,000 or under....

I know from reading other threads and posts on here, that the issue of 'splitting' claims is 'alien' to some peeps..but for all of us who have 'come over' from other sites it was what we were advised to do. I suppose its no-ones fault.. its just different sites with their own method of doing things.


The object of this post is to explain how/why it was done.



Bf xx

[Budgie]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Hi Outspoken,


Please see my responses in red !!!!!!!



I followed the advice given to me at the time and now I am in a thick bog and i'm not sure how to get myself out of the mire i am in. What do I do? I am waiting for Abbey to get back to me as they need to double check statements etc, which is fine, as I have included them all in the orginial court bundle and have a list of the charges done out separately)
OK, don’t panic, it may appear extremely complicated but in fact it is all quite easy to sort out. I will try to answer some of your concerns below.
I am quite happy to try and assist whichever way you wish to go.

I guess on the plus side, i am very lucky has i have managed to settle 3 claims prior to this with Abbey all at the 28.7% interest. Yes you were, as was everyone who had their claims settled prior to the test case announcement. Although truth be told you didn’t get them all at 28.7% interest, two of them were settled by negotiation at between 75-90% of the overall claim value and the other was in full but via a default judgment. In reality, even allowing for the settlement at between 75-90% of your claim you actually got paid out at a higher rate than would normally be possible because you used the other sites spreadsheet, which actually over calculates the compound interest. So yes, you were very lucky. However things have changed considerably now, mainly due to the test case and banks and credit card companies are examining claims in finer detail.

However I accept that i was extremely lucky to get this and now need to put my exsisting claims in order - even if the claims aren't settled then it will really ease my mind and know that when the courts restart then I am starting off on the right foot.
It’s good to hear that you are thinking that way. As I said in my earlier post on your thread, I feel that using the other sites spreadsheet may actually present some risks to Claimers so it is a wise move to get your claim approach straight at this stage anyway, whichever way you decide to proceed.

I have claims left in the court arena. 2 are at my local court, one is stayed at Northampton. All claims were done on line and when the claism were filed post copied of the POC, the spreadsheet, the list of charges and the statements were sent to the bank and MCOL via signed for post). I have asked Abbey to look at settling 2 of the claims under the hardship thingy - will look at tacking the 3rd one when i get over sorting this mess out, plus i have new charges which I don't know what to do about yet)
OK, as a first step, what I propose you should do is produce a new spreadsheet with all your outstanding charges on it. So, it should include all the charges that are on the 3 stayed claims plus any new charges you have incurred since filing those claims as well. Please use the attached sheet and email a copy to me when you are ready. The sheet is quite easy to fill out but please shout if you need any help. Don’t worry that it is a statutory interest spreadsheet I can easily convert it to compound interest if we need to do so later on.

___________________POC and details of the 2 Claims_________________________
I haven’t bothered commenting on the POC’s, at the moment they are irrelevant.


_________________________Questions and thought process______________________________

Thinking out loud (or writing out loud if that makes sense - plus you can follow my dribble of thought!!) I need to sort this interest thingy out and I would prefer to do this before Abbey get back to me. If i can approach them with a settlement offer that is more realistic than i first claimed then they maybe willing to go for it.
That is exactly my train of thought as well and why I have suggested you complete the attached spreadsheet.


How do i do this? - do a new spreadsheet listing the charges total amoutn debitted that month and the date they were debitted?
Yes, as I explained above, please fill out the attached spreadsheet

What rate of interest do I use?
Just fill out the sheet, it is a statutory interest spreadsheet based upon an 8% annual rate which is the rate the Courts and the Banks commonly use and is certainly the only rate that Abbey would consider using at this stage for your claim.

What do i do about Court interest and Court fees?
Court interest = statutory interest, so that is all worked out for you on the spreadsheet anyway. Court fees are covered in my further explanation below

So, as I already stated in my earlier post on this thread, sorry for repeating a lot of it, but I have added some additional notes as well.

There is currently an opportunity for people who are suffering financial hardship and who meet the hardship criteria as defined in the updated FSA complaints handling waiver to get some assistance from the Bank that they are claiming against. This does not necessarily mean that the Bank will pay you back your charges immediately, they may take some other action such as refraining from applying any additional charges to the account or freezing the interest or simply offering some financial advice, or they may not agree that you are suffering financial hardship, according to the FSA criteria, and do nothing.

One exception to this appears to be Abbey who have recently paid some genuine financial hardship claimers part of their claims and the signs are hopeful that this may continue to be the case. Some Legal Beagles claimers are attempting the same approach with Abbey and also with other Banks. I am sure you have read some of the threads about this already.

However, from everything we have seen so far and this is certainly the situation with Abbey, there appears to be absolutely no chance of getting a full or partial refund of charges if you attach compound interest to your financial hardship justification. So, in my view, the decision is quite simple, you just have to decide whether to proceed with your quest for settlement of your claims with Abbey, on financial hardship grounds with section 69 simple interest, or take a chance, do nothing now, wait for the end of the test case and then attempt to proceed with your claim, through the Court, on a compound interest basis. Indeed, if we do not succede in getting your claims settled as a result of this exercise then at least you will know exactly where you stand as far as your outstanding claims are concerned anyway.

By taking a chance and waiting for the end of the test case I mean that the final resolution of the test case is quite likely to include recommendations for how outstanding claims should actually be settled. Firstly we have to actually get the right decision, which may take a year or two and if that eventual decision does go our way there will certainly be an interest component included, the FSA have already stipulated this in the updated FSA waiver. However, this may or may not be a compound interest component. To be honest, it is quite likely that the recommendations will be for section 69 interest. However, it may well be that a compound interest element could be included, nobody knows.

Either way you would not lose out because the updated FSA waiver protects your rights in this respect. However, bear in mind that if the eventual recommendations are for section 69 interest only there is no way you will ever win a court claim for compound interest on a bank charges claim. Because the Courts would not consider paying compound interest if the test Case resolution recommendations state that only section 69 statutory interest should be paid.

I really do not think you have anything to lose by trying to get your claim settled under the financial hardship criteria now. If Abbey offer you a settlement figure you can decide to accept it or refuse it anyway. If you accept it then you are protected by the FSA Waiver. If at the end of the test case it is clear that you are entitled to more then the FSA waiver states that you will be entitled to receive it. That includes the interest element as well, if Abbey offer you a settlement figure that includes statutory interest only and the test case recommendations are that compound interest should be paid then once again your rights are protected in the FSA waiver. To my point of view it’s a WIN WIN situation. The other way of looking at it is if you accept a goodwill gesture from Abbey now and we eventually lose the test case you will not have to pay anything back ( basically because it is a goodwill gesture payment ).

So how should you go about trying to get your claim settled on hardship grounds.

Basically you have already started.

You have contacted Ronan and are awaiting his response.

You have informed him that you will send him an updated spreadsheet, OK lets get that done, checked and sent off to him with an updated email ( you can include details of your court fees in this email as well )

The whole purpose of what you are doing is to persuade / prove to Abbey that you are in financial hardship and encourage them to make you an "offer" to settle your court claims.If that doesn't work then at least we will have sorted out the exact status of your claim for when the test case is finally resolved.

If and when we get to the “offer” stage then please keep us all advised on here and we will help you every step of the way. It’s worth your while reading Ladidi’s thread to see the sort of tactics to be adopted after you receive an offer.

I hope the above has helped.

It’s sometimes difficult to get everything down in words and sometimes meanings are misunderstood. If you need any additional information at any point in this process then I would be happy to have a chat with you on the phone.

Regards Budgie

Link to spreadhseet http://www.legalbeagles.info/forums/...ead.php?t=4776

[sam]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Jen, you have won thousands with the RUC spread sheet so I dont think you need to worry about it. But if you want to go for less and use only the 8% then you do it. That bit is down to you. If you need the money and the banks are of course happy to pay less, then go for it.

[Budgie]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Hi Outspoken,

Please shout if you need any further help or assistance.

Hopefully all is clear for you now.

Let us know how you are getting on.

Budgie X

[fuzzybrain]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Hiya

Have such a busy weekend that my feet haven't touched the ground!

Have got a bit of an update from Abbey. I think i have had the standard reply from them about establishing financial hardship. They have asked for specific detials of financial hardship, together with supporting evidence of direct debit "return charges" (which is very helpful of them to also send 3 letters on the same informing me that they are going to charge me of 3 failed DD this month!!) credit card limits being exceeded and charges incurred, and other such evidence that we are in fionancial hardship.

This is very easy for us to do and i have started by gathering the list together and io will fax and post this off to them by mid week (just wating for a few bits of further evidence to come through the post)

haven't as yet had chance to look at the spreadsheet side of things, i am concentrating of the hardship side of the claim, but will hopeful have the spreadsheet done by mid week. Is there some one I can email this to to check once it's done please?

I have decided that I will wait and see what (if anything) Abbey offer before presenting any new spreadsheets to them.

Thanks for all the help, it is very much appreicated indeed - I copuld just do with either being cloned or another 12 hours in each day!!!

[Budgie]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Thanks Outspoken.

I would be more than happy to check your spready for you.

I will PM you my email address for when you need it.

Budgie XX

[fuzzybrain]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Have now managed to do the spreadsheet (have emailed copies to Budgie to check) and i have also managed to fax the required evidence of financial hardship to Abbey, so I guess it's a wait and see game now. Fingers crossed they come back with a nice offer.

[fuzzybrain]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Have spoken with Ronan as I wanted to ensure he had received the fas i sent through (all 20 pages of it!! Well he wanted evidence!!!)

Anyhow, he explained that they have been flooded with people requesting claims are looked at under the hardship criteria and Abbey have been devising a system to deal with the flood of request that have come in "in a consistent and fair manner" (his phrasing). Ronan stated that he had hoped that this system was going to finalised today and that they would be in a position to start of the backlog as soon as the system in implemented. However he has not yet received confirmation that the system is as of yet up and running, but expects this to be sorted by the end of tomorrow

Ronan stated that the backlog will be dealt with in date order and that a letter will be going out to all those requesting their claims to be looked at under the hardship criteria by the end of the week, detaling what information is required etc.

If you have receive a letter or are considering ask for a review under Finanical hardship then gather as much info asap, no matter how insignificant as it looks like Abbey are opening the door to settling charges refunds again.

Hope this info is helpful to people

[Budgie]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Excellent stuff Outspoken.

Have received your spreadsheets ( have sent you a PM ).

Will check this evening and get back to you in the morning, if not this evening.

Rgds Budgie

[Budgie]

Re: outspoken V abbey

I have responded to Outspoken via email.
I will leave it up to her if she wishes to post up her spreadsheet (s)

This is what I said.............

Hi Outspoken,

OK what I have done is combine the two spreadsheets that you sent me into one.

Personally, I would recommend that you add into this sheet all the charges from the third claim plus any additional charges they have applied since you filed that third claim.
By doing this you will have a spreadsheet with a total summary of all your outstanding charges plus the statutory court interest that is applicable to those charges.

When / if Abbey make you an offer ( hopefully this week ) they will probably just make you a one off offer against all your oustanding charges.
So by having a spreadsheet with everything in one place you will be able to directly compare what they offer to what you are expecting.
Whatever happens ask them to put any offer to you in writing by email or post, do not agree to anything over the phone.

Remember, that as part of this settlement they will expect you to discontinue your court claims.
This is OK and quite normal.
It is quite likely that Abbey will try to get you to accept a payment in full and final settlement of all your claims.
According to the FSA waiver they are actually not allowed to do this.
However, it is very important that you do not get into any discussions with them about full and final settlement.
It is part of the strategy to first get the money cleared into your account and then remind them of the FSA waiver conditions afterwards. ( See Ladidis thread for information about this ).

Even though you would be discontinuing your court claims your right to receive any additional money in respect of these charges is protected in the FSA waiver anyway. This includes any interest payment that might be included as part of any final decision in the test case. Basically if the eventual test case result means that you should have received more money from Abbey in settlelemnt of your claims then you will be entitled to that extra money. But again do not let Abbey know that you are aware of this. Keep your cards close to your chest !!!


Regards Budgie


Outspoken, I do have one question. Are you 100% sure that all the charges you have listed in the spreadsheets are actually charges?
Some of the individual amounts look very high and am a bit worried about some of the descriptions.
For my sanity, please just double check that what you have included are definitely charges.

[fuzzybrain]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Thanks Budgie, will open the pm in an minute, but repsonding to the post on her

Yes they are all charges, I have the statements that clearly say they are charges.

I might have confused you by lumping them altogether as a lot of them were things like 10 x charges for the same type of charge on the same day for that month - I.E 3 x returned Direct Debits @ £32 = £96 Abbey charged me at the end of the month for all charges due that month.

I sent a break down of the charges (I.E the date the charged was debitted, the name of the charge, the amount of those type of charges and the total amount charged for them) and highlighted the charges on the statements when i field the court claim (sent them to MCOL and Abbey via signed For post)

Does that make a bit more sense, I'm really good at causing confusion.

I have decided not to include the 3rd claim, as i don't have a list of the current charges i have received - I need to reorder the statements for the past 12 months and check what I have been charged for. In a moment of madness i threw away my statements thinking they were ones I had already dealt with and no longer needed - i know i'm a silly cow who needs to be shot!!! Until I have all the full info etc for this claim, then I think it's best to leave it alone, especially as it's not a huge claim in the first place. - although it may well be now with the additional charges to add on!!!

I would post the shreadsheets, but it won't let me!!! Budgie if you want to pst them that's fine by me - If it helps others out then i'm all for it

[Budgie]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Thanks Budgie, will open the pm in an minute, but repsonding to the post on her

Yes they are all charges, I have the statements that clearly say they are charges.

I might have confused you by lumping them altogether as a lot of them were things like 10 x charges for the same type of charge on the same day for that month - I.E 3 x returned Direct Debits @ £32 = £96 Abbey charged me at the end of the month for all charges due that month.
Excellent that's all clear now, you could have put each individual charge on the spreadsheet but decided to lump everything levied on the same day as one charge, that's fine !!

I sent a break down of the charges (I.E the date the charged was debitted, the name of the charge, the amount of those type of charges and the total amount charged for them) and highlighted the charges on the statements when i field the court claim (sent them to MCOL and Abbey via signed For post)

Does that make a bit more sense, I'm really good at causing confusion.

I have decided not to include the 3rd claim, as i don't have a list of the current charges i have received - I need to reorder the statements for the past 12 months and check what I have been charged for. In a moment of madness i threw away my statements thinking they were ones I had already dealt with and no longer needed - i know i'm a silly cow who needs to be shot!!! Until I have all the full info etc for this claim, then I think it's best to leave it alone, especially as it's not a huge claim in the first place. - although it may well be now with the additional charges to add on!!!
OK, I understand that. However IF Abbey make you an offer it will be in respect of all of the charges they have levied to your account. It is very unlikley that they will split an offer down into so much against this court claim and so much against the other court claim etc. They will also expect you to discontinue any and all court claims that you have against them. Is there no way you can get hold of this information quickly ( Ie the list of charges in the third stayed court claim and the new charges applied since that claim). Can you not get these details via your internet banking facility.

Sorry if I am being a pain on this but I am worried that things may move quite quickly on your request to resolve your claim. If you get an offer you will probably then be asking us for advice on how you should proceed and we won't really be able to assist because we have no idea on how much you are actually expecting in total. Plus I really think it would be useful for you to have everything regarding your outstanding charges all sorted and up to date so that you know exactly where you are with things.

Budgie

[fuzzybrain]

Re: outspoken V abbey

No, as the internet banking only holds a certain amount of transactions unfortunately.

Why does including the 3rd claim matter so much? I have only asked Abbey to look at these 2 claims and they have only referred to these 2 claim. Admittedly I haven't mentioned to them that a 3rd claim in the system, they should know anyhow - they defended it!!! If they chose to mention it and ask for it to be included then I will probably agree to the claim being included as it is (without the addition of any further charges) and start a new claim for the any charges incurred since the date of the last court claim.

When they settled all my other claims they did it on a claim by claim basis. After all all each claim is seperate and has different court number. If i accept settlement it is only for the claims mentioned, not for any or further claims surely????

[Budgie]

Re: outspoken V abbey

No, as the internet banking only holds a certain amount of transactions unfortunately.

Why does including the 3rd claim matter so much? I have only asked Abbey to look at these 2 claims and they have only referred to these 2 claim. Admittedly I haven't mentioned to them that a 3rd claim in the system, they should know anyhow - they defended it!!! If they chose to mention it and ask for it to be included then I will probably agree to the claim being included as it is (without the addition of any further charges) and start a new claim for the any charges incurred since the date of the last court claim.

When they settled all my other claims they did it on a claim by claim basis. After all all each claim is seperate and has different court number. If i accept settlement it is only for the claims mentioned, not for any or further claims surely????

The third claim and any more recent charges matter because Abbey will probably and HOPEFULLY try to offer you a settlement in respect of all your charges in one go, not just the ones which are the subject of the two claims that you have requested they look at. If you dont actually know what the total of charges is then how will you know if what they offer you is a fair offer ???

Wouldn't you rather have it all sorted now in one go and then await the final outcome of the test case to see if you are entitled to receive any extra ?????

In reality you did not need to actually raise three individual claims anyway. The charges in your first two claims total £1600 and you say that the third claim is not for very much in the way of charges. You only entered seperate claims because that is how you were advised to proceed by the other site. You didn't need to do it that way. It's the total level of charges that are important from the track allocation point of view, as long as the total of charges are less than £5000 you can expect your claim to be allocated to the small claims track. Although the amount of interest claimed is relevant with respect to the cost of actually filing your claim it is not taken into account for track allocation purposes.

If you don't want to or cannot get your spreadsheet fully up to date now, at least with the details of your three stayed claims then thats fine. You could probably phone Abbey and ask the to send you a print out of the charges that have been applied to your account for the period since your last filed court claim.


Regards Budgie

[fuzzybrain]

Re: outspoken V abbey

Ok I will get copy statements order for the past 14 months and see what comes for that.

Will update the spreadsheet with the charges of the 3rd claim. I was concerned that Abbey might be a bit peed off with me suddenly mentioning 3 claims in one go (especially as I previously thought i was correct in charging the 28.7% interest - I now know differently) so felt it best just to hit them for 2 claims and then hit them for the 3rd one when the other 2 claims are settled.

I'm just a bit worried about going to Abbey and saying - guess what i've got another claim to add to the 2 i've already mentioned. I thought it might be best to the poor little dears a couple of weeks breathing space before hitting them the 3rd one for settlement. Now that the interest has reduced so dramatically the settlement of the other 2 claimj isn't going to clear our financial hardships issues completely (althought it gets us out of the immediate trouble we are in to some degree, we wpould still meet a great deal of the hardship criteria), so we will still be able to apply for settlement under the hardship criteria.