Hi all, I have been charged over £750 in penalty charges in the last 18 months and after reading about the legalities decided to take some action.

i spoke at length to the Nationwide and they promised to refund the charges, they have not done so. I wrote last week and threatened legal action (as they would not answer my letters).

The result is:

They have removed my overdraft facility

My cards have been cancelled

My flexaccount has been removed from the internet banking site

I am stuffed??

I am going to try to open a basic account with another bank (Abbey?) to pay my salary into and invite them to sue me for the blance on my account. Any ideas to help would be much appreciated. I did thankfully download all my statements for the period as a CSV file and have these in a spreadsheet.

They have given me derogetory credit rating with experian too. I am really annoyed!!!!!!

Welcome to the forum!

Sorry to hear about your experiences - did they give you any warning that they were going to close your account? From what you're saying it certainly doesn't sound like they tried to make it a condition of accepting the repayment. Have they actually made the repayment, or do they still owe you the charges on top of closing your account?

I would certainly write to Experian and get them to put a note against the entry stating your point of view; anyone noting the bad credit reference has to be told your side of it if you've requested that to be held against the reference, so it's certainly worth contacting them and asking them to put a note against it.

With regards to the Nationwide account, if they've agreed to repay the charges and those charges come to more than your overdraft, I'd write to them and say you've saved them the bother of writing the cheque by considering the overdraft repayed out of the money they owe you, and by the way can they send you the balance between your overdraft and what they owe you. If the overdraft is more than the amount they owe you, you could offer to settle the balance, setting out clearly that the amount you owe is the overdraft value MINUS the charges they've agreed to pay back. This removes their opportunity to accuse you of nonpayment.

Whatever you decide, let us know how it goes. Good luck.

Christian

This is the usual kind of story but a bit more vicious than we normally hear.

Have they actually closed your account or just the Internet access?

If they have closed the account then of course they are probably relying on the usual contractual terms which aparently allows them to close your account at any time, at any time at their discretion.

I think that there are two issues.

The recovery of your £750 charges

and the reinstatement of your account to its original status.

The £750 shouldn't be a problem. If the money was charged by way of penalties then it is probably taken unlawfully in that the charges far outweigh the cost to the bank of your "transgressions"

You should wirte the then immediatly, explain to them that the charges are unlawful penalties and tell them that you will issue proceeding wihtin 14 days of they do not repay you in full.

Don't make this threat if you don't mean it.

Have look at http://www.moneyclaim.gov.uk to see how you go about it.

But also come back here if there is anything you are not certain about and you will get the advice and information you need.

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The reinstatement of your account is a little more difficult.

I suppose that we have to be quite open and frank to deal with these problems.

The bank retains a right to close your account at any time. in fact this is an unfair term under the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999. there is ahort anaysis at http://www.journalonline.co.uk/article/1001153.aspx

On the other hand, this may not be an arbitrary act by the Nationwide.

You have incurred a ot of penalties over the last 18 months and if the Bank can show that you have not been conducting your account correctly over a period of time, then they could argue that they had given you time and had acted as a last resort. You and I now that they are just retaliating but it it was the court believes that counts.

You might be better off leaving this one alone unless you can point to sime reasonable action by the bank. For instance if you can show that it was their charges which prevented you from sorting things out and in fact it was thier unlawful charges which kept you in difficulty and caused the incurrence of further penalties, then you probably have an argument.

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Finally, I'd like to say that it is clear in my mind at least that as the pressure builds up on the banks as more and more people start to take action, I expect that the banks wil start getting nastier.

I am sure that they will imagine that a big stick will be useful to keep everyone in place. (How can they be so wrong?)

Your kind of story will become more common.

My own bank has now threatened to close my account if I continue to threaten them. My reaction has been to go and open new accounts with three other banks so that I have chequebooks, internet and debit cards all ready before I start my latest process (it won't be my first).

My strong advice to anyone who is going to sue their bank is to get ready while you can. Open bank accounts so that it hurts as little as possible when your bank takes retaliatory action.

Well, today the Nationwide rang me and as usual started off quite aggressive. Alleging fraud as I had issued cheques knowing I did not have the cash to cover them. I refuted this and said I was fed up, would open another account elsewhere and would not pay them anything. We all calmed down then and surprisingly they agreed as a goodwill gesture to pay £300 in charges back, put my account back to working, reinstated my oevrdraft and have reactivated my cards. I can if I wish still sue for the balance, have not signed any agreement re confidentiality and am a happy bunny.

I will be eating meat tonight not lentil stew!!!!!!!!

Congratulations! This is the sort of story we hope will become more common in the coming months. It's a shame they didn't pay everything back, but even what they have paid is excellent, especially since they have also reinstated your account.

Christian, see my post in "Me vs Nationwide", my experience is quite similar to yours.

Open a basic bank account with either HSBC or Cooperative, apparently they don'y levy charges on them. (and HSBC won't mind your Default)

if the bank promised to refund the charges and you agreed with them you have a legally binding contract contracts can be entered into by verbal agreement. any bank will quickly back track if they have made an agreement and then violated in this way fearful youll sue them for consequential losses too (which i would if i were you). its sad though to see a building society doing this, they are supposed to represent their members, afterall by banking with them you have a share in them dont you?

Just a quick question on this.

Could they in Theory close any other accounts you hold with the Building society? Say for instance you have a membership account with them I.E a Bonus Saver or an Mini Cash ISA?

You would lose membership priviledges the right to vote and any potential "Windfall" should they go down that route?? Would it be legal for them to close accounts that are in no way in dispute?

Mark.

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