Advantage Gold Account - Bank Charges claim

[L3ON]

Hi
I put a claim to the Ombudsman for the return of fees for my Advantage Gold account after months of wrangling with the bank over its perceived mis-sale which the bank denied. However I received a letter from the Ombudsman who has advised that whilst they haven't looked at my case or paperwork yet the bank wants to make me an offer which constitutes of the return of my fees plus interest, less any benefit I received for the preferential loan and overdraft rates I received. Thats fine as it stands. However I want a lot more than that if redress is supposed to put me back in a position I would have been had I not paid those Service fees. If I do a running total on the account from the account start, the bank hypothetically owed me £85 in Service fees before they applied a lending charge of £25 to the account. If you remove that charge and add subsequent Service Fees, the next charge of £35 was again more than covered by what the bank is now prepared to return to me in Service Fees. When you continue in this vein all of my bank charges are wiped out and i believe should be returned to me with interest. In short we are talking about a reconstruction of the account. I hope this makes sense.


Now I believe Lou Lou probably benefited from having a running total of Services charges which facilitated the return of her bank charges which her bank returned. However, this occurred without the intervention of the Ombudsman and my bank having previously kicked up a fuss will not want to pay me 20 x what they are offering. (Which would be the outcome) and I believe the Ombudsman would be reluctant to do the same given that they have recommended that I take the offer as they believe it to be fair My questions are below:




Has anybody benefited from this approach from an adjudication via the Ombudsman before when they got or sought redress?
If this level of redress has been declined by the bank and or the Ombudsman, has it be tested in court and if so what were the outcomes?
Other than Lou Lou do we any other cases out there where the accounts were reconstructed and lending charges returned/


The Ombudsman as not actually come up with an adjudication as yet and has asked that I wait for the bank to get back in contact with me. I am asking the above questions in anticipation of receiving contact from the bank and I just need to determine my next steps.


Do we have any Advantage Gold/Ombudsman/redress specialists on this forum who can answer my questions? If so, please do!


Thank you

[leclerc]

Re: Advantage Gold Account - Bank Charges claim

To be blunt, if they are offering all charges back excluding the benefit that you did actually get then take it because if you are including overdraft charging for exceeding the limit then the only clarification i might have suggested would be IF the amount that you went overdrawn by was equal or less than the cost of the advantage Gold, ie £12.95 or however much it cost at the point it went overdrawn.
However, if these charges arose because you went overdrawn within the month more than the ADGD charge then forget about it.
Clarify but DO NOT reject it because you may find that you'll get nothing because you declined the offer.

A win is a win regardless

[L3ON]

Re: Advantage Gold Account - Bank Charges claim

Hi leclerc

Thanks for getting back to me and thanks for the steer. Most of these charges did arise because I went overdrawn within the month more than the ADGD charge but I'm still going to make a claim to the Ombudsman for a return of those charges given that when they took the first charge they already 'owed' me £85 so they should not have taken it. And that charge helped to incur other charges. I expect this to be rejected of course but my question however is whether anybody knows whether this type of action/approach around an ADGD account has been tested in court. I am prepared to go that route to make my case if required but I cannot find any details. Do you know of any such actions whether they failed or otherwise and how would one circumnavigate the Statute of Limitations to make a case?

Any ideas?

[leclerc]

Re: Advantage Gold Account - Bank Charges claim

Hi leclerc

Thanks for getting back to me and thanks for the steer. Most of these charges did arise because I went overdrawn within the month more than the ADGD charge but I'm still going to make a claim to the Ombudsman for a return of those charges given that when they took the first charge they already 'owed' me £85 so they should not have taken it. And that charge helped to incur other charges. I expect this to be rejected of course but my question however is whether anybody knows whether this type of action/approach around an ADGD account has been tested in court. I am prepared to go that route to make my case if required but I cannot find any details. Do you know of any such actions whether they failed or otherwise and how would one circumnavigate the Statute of Limitations to make a case?

Any ideas?

I'm saying to you NOT to nail your colours to a all or nothing approach otherwise you will be declining an offer and you'll have nowhere else to go.
I would ask the question but if the ADGD charges did not take you overdrawn then expect them to say no.
My understanding is that it has not been tested in court with specifically packaged accounts but it may be a lot more difficult to argue in court imho.

[L3ON]

Re: Advantage Gold Account - Bank Charges claim

Thanks leclerc

Your advice regarding the all or nothing approach has been noted and |I will indeed come away with something. There will be no decline any offer but I will certainly make suggestions towards what I believe that offer should look like. I will put my case and let the Ombudsman look at it if the adjudicator is not playing ball as it were.

Thanks again for the advice.

[L3ON]

Ok guys. Just to box this off. I didn't get any bank charges back however I settled this with the FOS. The first offer from the bank was for £1360.45 the FOS's final decision was £2834.38. The big difference was the statutory interest. It turns out this is at the discretion of the Ombudsman who decided to award the overdraft rate as the statutory interest rate.

Thanks everybody for your help and advice.

[Phaeton]

WOW Well done I was with Nat West for 35 years since 1980 & they took £1000's off me in charges, I wish I could get some of it back

[L3ON]

Thanks Phaeton. The guys on here might be able to advise you regarding claiming back bank charges. I will be attempting to get my charges back also. My approach will be to get all my bank statements and add them to an excel spreadsheet. I will then get forensic on all the charges and look for mistakes. Things like an unpaid direct debit that was requested too early so incurring a charge. Was a direct debit unpaid when you had sufficient funds available. Was you done for card misuse when you had sufficient funds etc. Its a long task but over 35 years i reckon those mistakes are in there. Go for it!

[Phaeton]

Money was tight when the kids were growing up, especially in the early 90's we had things like 8 charges in a single day amounting to over £200 when we were already over overdraft & all they did was make it harder for us. Problem is I think it's far too long ago to do anything about it, in those days there was nothing you could do, we couldn't go anywhere else as they wouldn't take us.

[L3ON]

Its not far too long ago at all Phaeton. All you need are your bank statements and the will and you can start making a case.