So what happeed next to my reverse Strategy? Nothing till today, then two things simultaneously. Firstly, I had my debit card, also with Bank of Scotland declined when I knew there was money in the account. Secondly, I got an offer of a "goodwill payment" for pretty much what I had asked for, to be credited into my card account. As for that I will probabaly accept, although I have acouple of niggles. Firstly, they have not refunded recent £12 charges as they say they have been ruled legit. Secondly, the refund does not cover the entire balance because they have charged me interest since i made the original complaint, so I still have a small balance to pay off. But they are such small sums i don't mind too much. What really gets to me is that, without notice, it turns out they had suspended access to my current account because i was not paying my card bills. i.e.because of a dispute about them unlawfully taking money from me, they had denied me access to such money as I have. Great was my wrath on the 'phone to the puir wee BOS woman! They said they would unblock the account, but my debit card has just been declined again. I will keep you posted. So, not sure how well my reverse strategy has worked. But at least, "another day older but NOT deeper in debt". At least today...

Two things occur to me at this point: Firstly Lloyds reduction in their charges means that the original subject of the thread - that Lloyds are about to run up the white flag in the OFT case- is not likely to be true, because the new charge structure would then be found unlawful like the original one in a week or two. Secondly, it is a good thing because it means that the banks have broken rank on charges and will now have to compete with one another; if the OFT case drags on for years, at least there will be a genuine choice, with some pressure on the banks to be seen to be the one that rips us off the least instead of the current cartel approach.

You can counterclaim, or let them claim against you - if they get as far as serving notice on you, simply enter the defence that the amount claimed is wrong because the charges were unlawfull - they are very unlikely to proceed!

I wrote to my local MP Diane Abbott (Bless!) and she responded thus; 16th August 2007 Dear xxx, Thank you for your recent correspondence regarding the penalty fees charged by banks. I agree with you that these fees are completely unfair and have been pleased that more and more people are challenging banks when they are charged. I also agree that the current situation is not satisfactory, despite the fact that the Office of Fair Trading are taking positive steps to rectify the situation. I will be writing to the OFT on your behalf and will get back to you as soon as I hear from them. Yours sincerely, Diane Abbott MP She is a general good egg.

Ogre, your situation with Barclaycard is similar to my own with my HBOS visa card in that the balance is entirely made up of charges - in fact, it is by my calaculation in credit to the tune of a tenner. My approach has been to say that I will simply regard the account as closed and let them off the tenner. I have no intention of going to court on this one. Their response so far indicates that they haven't understood what I am doing. I am interested to see if they threaten legal action when they do; "make my day, Punk"! I have promised not to apply for a stay!

Ppauls wrote "they are defaulting me now for £525 and on the same day have received a letter from their debt collectors telling me to pay this amount outstanding immediatly". They should not have defaulted you when the account was in dispute. As to the debt collectors, you need to write to them politely explaining that the account is in dispute and that if they try to get a CCJ you will defend on the basis that you do not owe all or part of the money. They will probably pass this hot potato back to the card company, who will now with luck read your correspondance properly.

This is a very interesting approach and is similar to one I am taking about a credit card at the moment. I had a credit card on which I calculated that the charges were approximately equal to the balance; actually £10 more. The bank, HBOS, closed the account and had asked me to give my proposals for paying off the balance. My response has been to say, "You owe me a tenner, but I'll forget it if you consider the account settled". I am awaiting a response but suspect that I have the bank at a disadvantage - they are unlikely to try to recover the debt because that would involve going to court, which is the last thing they want. To avoid the possibility of them coming back to me in the unlikely event of the OFT test case ruling in favour of the banks, I have specified that if they do not accept my terms for clearing the balance, they must communicate this to me within 14 days or I will consider them to have agreed. I'm currently waiting! Hope this helps. What I call the "reverse strategy" - ie. challenge the banks to take the customer to court - won't work for every situation, but where it does it offers possibilities during these post 28/7 times!

I am about to submit an N1 to reclaim charges from a Virgin One account, administered by RBOS. A V1 account is like a combined mortgage and current account, and none of the charges is for an unauthorised over draft - they are all simply for unpaid items. Am I likely to get stayed, and how can I reduce the chance of this in advance? I plan to use MCOL, its worked for me before, but does anyone have any info on the courts used - Northampton, and then a transfer to Bow if it comes to it?

That's interesting. It certainly could be that quite a few people could employ the "reverse strategy" in these post test case times, ie. you take your money and then rely on the fact that the bank is just as reluctant to go to court as the claimant as it previously was as the defendant. Only pitfall I can see is that if the test case goes the banks' way (heaven forbid) they come after you then! You have to ensure there is some kind of recognised settlement.

When I successfuly claimed a total of £8.2 k off HBOS, they used the next opportunity to close my credit card account. They asked me to supply my proposal for repaying the balance. I obtained my statements and worked out that the charges and the balance were nearly the same - in fact, they owed me about a tenner. I have said i will let them off the tenner if they just regard the account as closed and having no balance. If they object, I have said, they can always take me to court. I promise not to apply for a stay!

Jezanator wrote; ps I am left wondering about all those peeps out there that due to their lack of knowledge have not embarked on the journey that all of us have. I am using the knowledge I have gained to help a work colleague through all of this who would not know the first thing to do; let alone the computer literacy of all of this he would need. He had his first offer the other day from the bank, which I have encouraged him to accept. I posted this elsewhere but it hasn't had any response or much of a view; The OFT is about as popular at the moment on this Forum as Barclay’s Bank, and with good reason. Haven’t they derailed our gravy train, weren’t we doing so well, finally the little people having Big Business by the short-and-curlies, meekly coughing up sums that would pay for a holiday, a kitchen or a decent car? And now they’ve gone and spoiled our fun putting everything on hold for god-knows-how long. Well yes. But consider this. The people who use this and other websites, ie. the ones who stand best chance of getting a payout are by definition computer users, computer literate enough to use a simple spreadsheet, have enough grasp of the law to understand the principals of using the courts, and Not Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf. As a Union Convenor, it crossed my mind to hold a lunchtime information session to get people started on reclaiming their charges. I could have explained what it was about, given a few examples and pointed them at this site. Then I thought; I represent people who work in and inner London borough. Statistically, only about 30% of them have access to a computer or e-mail at home or at work. Of those, a smaller proportion will be able or inclined to navigate a large website and take in the information, some of it complex, they need. A smaller still proportion could use a spreadsheet; many of them would not even know what a spreadsheet was. If I had gone ahead, I would have had to put up with shepherding some people through the process every step of the way. I am sure it would have taken me more time than I have to spend on all the shenanigans that currently go on with my employer. I would also be held responsible for anything that went wrong with anyone’s claim. So, I say two cheers for the OFT. We can all feel proud of what we have managed with the excellent help of sites like this, but we really are the tip of the iceberg. If the OFT win their case, at some point in the distant future a lot of people who may not even have grasped what has been going on will be quids in. The rest of us can get our claims in now: provided the interest clocks up during the stay, 8% is a good a rate as you will get anywhere.

The OFT is about as popular at the moment on this Forum as Barclay’s Bank, and with good reason. Haven’t they derailed our gravy train, weren’t we doing so well, finally the little people having Big Business by the short-and-curlies, meekly coughing up sums that would pay for a holiday, a kitchen or a decent car? And now they’ve gone and spoiled our fun putting everything on hold for god-knows-how long. Well yes. But consider this. The people who use this and other websites, ie. The ones who stand best chance of getting a payout are by definition computer users, computer literate enough to use a simple spreadsheet, have enough grasp of the law to understand the principals of using the courts, and Not Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf. As a Union Convenor, it crossed my mind to hold a lunchtime information session to get people started on reclaiming their charges. I could have explained what it was about, given a few examples and pointed them at this site. Then I thought; I represent people who work in and inner London borough. Statistically, 30% of them have access to a computer or e-mail at home or at work. Of those, a smaller proportion will be able or inclined to navigate a large website and take in the information, some of it complex, they need. A smaller still proportion could use a spreadsheet; many of them would not even know what a spreadsheet was. If I had gone ahead, I would have had to put up with shepherding some people through the process every step of the way. I am sure it would have taken me more time than I have to spend on all the shenanigans that currently go on with my employer. I would also be held responsible for anything that went wrong with anyone’s claim. So, I say two cheers for the OFT. We can all feel proud of what we have managed with the excellent help of sites like this, but we really are the tip of the iceberg. If the OFT win their case, at some point in the distant future a lot of people who may not even have grasped what has been going on will be quids in. The rest of us can get our claims in now: provided the interest clocks up during the stay, 8% is a good a rate as you will get anywhere.

Well, I hope the way you do it is like any other account - get statements, identify the charges and claim them back, for starters, which is what I have just done. These accounts are basically a mortgage, but they also have a chequebook, direct debits etc. If you are maxed out, ie borrowed up to your facility, you will get bounced, charged etc. just like a current account. Clokester, at what stage did they pay up for you?

Oh, and about agreeing to pay any further charges - you agreed to pay the charges when you opened the account! Doesn't make them legal, though.

My recent experience is that they acknowledged service giving them 28 days (from the date of service, not from the acknowledgement) to file a defence. In fact they paid up with interest £3.8k (!) the day before the 28 days were up. It just appeared in my account, followed by a letter about it "not being in their commercial interests to defend" a day later.Dam' right! Hope it is as painless for you - but do be prepared in case it ever does get to court.

Thanks, Yanni i will bear that in mind.

I had a max'd out Bank of Scotland Classic Visa card. After I got a £3,800 refund off my current account, I missed a payment on the Visa and they closed my account and asked for the card back, perhaps in retaliation. They also asked me to give my proposals for repaying the balance. Well, I'm happy to let them have their card. As to repayment, first we have to agree on a balance. As there are plenty of penalty charges on it,I have asked that they be cancelled, interest recalculated and a new balance arrived at. This is for the whole life of the account, many many years. It may even result in a credit balance! If so, they pay me; if not, I pay them, but a reduced amount. They may not like this; if not, they can always take me to court. I expect they will relish the opportunity to get this whole charge business sorted out once and for all in court....not! I'll keep you all posted.

I have just written to Virgin One claiming back £3800.00 in charges they made when we had an account with them. This is my first claim against V1 but overall third claim, so I am beginning to know what's what. Has anyone any experience with claims against Virgin One? It is part of the RBS group, and it is a kind of hybrid mortgage/current account.

In my case, they acknowledged the MCOL service giving them 28 days from service to file a defence. In fact they let it go right to the wire; they paid up on Tuesday and yesterday (Wednesday) I experimentally clicked the "request judgement" button, to find that MCOL would have allowed me to proceed! Onwards to my old Virgin One account now!

Yes, thanks for your interest. The bank did not enter a defence and paid up quite unexpectedly yesterday - complete with interest.

Bank of Scotland has paid up today, they had until 28th June to file a defence. Excellent surprise, my financial situation was looking dire.! Suddenly £3,800.00 in the bank.

I'm indebted to m'learned friend. A pity there is not a similar procedure relating to private bodies.

Would a judicial review not be a way of forcing the banks into court on the charges issue?

Two reasons, Phantom; that it would involve moving and that it would take time to sell the house.

We are in a situation where we just have too much secured debt on our house to live on what is left at payday. To cut a long story short, we are thinking of approaching a number of firms who buy your house - for somewhat less than its market vakue - and rent it back to you. This is not a good deal in some respects, but would give us a liveable budget and a large amount in the bank from the equity on the house. Any experience with these firms out there?