Bank Charges - Office of Fair Trading.

The OFT is taking a test case on bank charges, the site is here, this will affect the following banks:

The following are parties to the agreement with OFT for the test case:

• Abbey National plc
• Barclays Bank plc
• Clydesdale Bank plc
• HBOS plc
• HSBC Bank plc
• Lloyds TSB Bank plc
• Nationwide Building Society
• Royal Bank of Scotland Group plc

They say at the end that they hope to have come to a view on fairness by about the end of the year.

We would then take appropriate steps to enforce our view, including enforcement action if the banks do not voluntarily co-operate.

Now I can not wait for this test case to happen. The corporate thieves and yes I have no worries about calling them thieves, who pass themselves off as banks have for far to long used their position to steal the hard earned money from their very customers on the thinest of pretexts.

The banks will argue that their charges are "fair", of course to anyone who ever has had the situation of something going wrong, being mis advised or in some other way being landed with a charge that can be anything up to 38quid for the smallest infraction of the banks rules will know that the fair arguement doesn't cut much ice.

Never mind the fact that it is the banks fault that the account was in error and thus charges were incurred, as far as these corporate thieves are concerned well thats not their problem, as the advert says "It doesn't work like that."

Having won my case, to the tune of 900 notes but not as yet recieved an apology from the corporate thieves at Barclays Bank Plc I hope that this case nails the banks greedy hides to the wall and they have to pay up each and every claim made against them, plus those people who have been charged and who may feel that they will not win a case.

That is a part of the problem that the banks rely on that a lot of people will either not notice a "one off" charge or just think that they can not win and so leave the charge in place.

The main arguement is that the charge covers costs, well having a computer print out an automated letter and posting that first/second class to the customer when they go 1 penny over the limit or draw out 10 pound to much at the cashpoint sure as hell don't cost the banks 38 quid in costs.

They will argue as Mark Benton does on the Nationwide adverts that "It doesn't work like that.", they will I am sure let people know that fiscally raping their account of money does in fact help customers.

I have actually heard them argue that fact, stating that charges encourge responsible saving, in much the same way that rape encourages well planned familys, and I have seen letters where they argue that penalty charges are in the customers best iterests! You as customers can always go here to see about reclaiming the money illegally stolen by your bank. There are templates and a simple e-mail to the banks complaint section or letter off to them and the job is started.

Tags: Bank Charges, Banking, Information Commissioner, Charges, The Financial Ombudsman

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