LISAM, The sourt date is June 12 and the letter from S,C & M arrived today. I still have to check that the money is in my account though. I will keep you posted. Kenbostero

Many Thanks!

Hello!!!! I started yesterday to print out the court bundle. I wanted to do it as early as possible. Today, I opened a letter from S, C & M and Lloyds will settle my claim. They will deposit £674.84 in my account within five working days!!!!!:) How amazing is that? This includes interest and fees! I would like to thank everyone that helped me in this journey! And for all the support I got!!! Let's hope the banks start to get the message! Many thanks again, Kenbostero :)

Hey Barty! Congratulations! I am joining you in the joy! I have just received a letter from S,C & M saying that Lloyds will settle my claim with interest! Thank you for all your help and support! Kenbostero

Croydon County Court has not sent me one either. Kenbostero

Hi Barty! I dont know what the directions on the Court date letter are. But this is what it reads: District Judge XXXX has considered the statements of case and allocation questionaires filed and allocated the claim to the small claims track. The hearing of the claim will take place at 10:00 on the 12 June 2007 at Croydon County Court, Altyre Road, Croydon, Surrey, CR9 5AB and should take no longer than two hours. The Court must be informed immediately if the case is settled by agreement before the hearing date. Each party shall deliver to every other party and to the court office copies of all documents on which he intends to rely at the hearing. These may include: the contract, witness statements, experts' reports, photographs, invoices for work done or goods supplied, estimates for work to be done. The copies shall be delivered no later than 14 days before the hearing. The original documents shall be brought to the hearing. The rest is just instructions on what to do on the day of the hearing and what to do if you can not make it to court, etc. I hope this is what you were asking. I did have a read of GOT A COURT DATE? And found some interesting things there. Thanks Barty for your help! Kenbostero

Hi there! I received a court date today. The hearing will take place on the 12 June at 10AM. We are moving on and I am scared. I have read that Lloyds has not defended any case so far but that does not mean that they won't defend this one. Now I have to prepare my ammunitions so I can defend myself in court. I did not received any AQ which is weird. No? The letter from the court says that the judge has condidered the statements of case and allocation questionnaires filed and allocated the claim to small claims track. Now, I rang the county court and they have said that this was an automated letter and that my claim has bypassed this part so I do not have to fill an AQ. What is interesting is that Lloyds has said to the court that they paid me which is not true. I received a letter from them about two weeks ago telling me that they had made a mistake by taking money in "penalties" from my account and they had overlooked at my arrangement with the bank, therefore they were going to return £74. Not nearly enough when my claim is of almost £600! They are crazy! Any words of advise? Kenbostero

Thank you again! Kenbostero

Hey Barty, Any advise on how should I word this cover letter to the lawyers? Thanks, Kenbostero

:)Thank you very much! Kenbostero:)

Thank you Barty! Should I send the solicitors a copy of the up to date schedule of charges and interest or should I send them the one that was up to date at the time of filing the claim? Thanks again, Michelle

Hi Barty, I just phoned the court and they say that what I received today is a notification that the claim has been transfered to Croydon County Court and when it is reffered to the Judge, then I f he thinks it is necessary, then they will send me an allocation questionaire. In the meant time all I have to do is wait. I guess that is good news. Although it feels that there is something else I could do. Many thanks once again, Kenbostero

Hi Barty, They entered only 7 points. At least that is what I received today in the post. I copy the entire thing on the post. What worries me is that I have been reading a lot in this forum. For the information I have read I think (since I filed my claim online), I needed to send a full schedule of the charges to the court and a description of what they were for. And I am also menat to send a copy of it to the lawyers. I have done nothing like that. Now that I have received their defence I have no idea if I am still meant to send this schedule to the court or to the lawyers. The lawyers are menat to have a copy of it anyways since I sent it to Lloyds when I sent them the two initial letters. One they replied the second they ignored which is what led me to file a claim. Many thanks, Kenbostero Claim number: 7QZ38859 Claiming £523.08 Interest: £65.4 Court Fee : £80 Total Claim: £668.48

Hello there again! Lloyds Bank has entered their defence. I have just received it in the post. This is What they have to say: First they dispute the full amount claimed as shown on the claim form. This is what their defence states: 1. By opening an account with the Bank, the customer enters into a Commercial arrangement with the Bank for the provision of banking services. The Bank is entitled, as part of that arrangement, to charge for those services. At account opening a customer is provided with details of the Bank?s charges, currently in a leaflet a guide to our banking charges. By using the account, the customer acknowledges that the charges are incorporated into the contract. For personal customers, a number of services are provided for free,(what about the service charge I paid every month of £10 for holding a Gold Account - NOT FREE) notwithstanding that they are an expense to the Bank. Such services presently include, but are not limited to, providing; cheques, bank statements, the facility to make payments by direct debit and standing order debit cards, ATMs (cash machines). 2. By maintaining The account in credit, or within any limit agreed with the Bank, the customer may avoid most if not all charges. If the customer fails to ensure that there are sufficient cleared funds in the account to cover payments, whether by cheque, debit card, standing order or direct debit, the customer makes a request for a payment to be made from the Bank?s own funds. If the Bank makes payment, or returns the payment, it provides a service as specified in the leaflet and makes a charge in accordance with the terms of the contract.(Is this a charge or an unlawful penalty) On page 1 of the leaflet, the Bank explains that ? there are normally no charges for everyday banking at Lloyds TSB when your account is in credit. (What about the £10 I've been paying every month as service charge for holding an account with them? For the "great service they are providing?)) When you use an agreed overdraft, there is no monthly fee and we only charge interest on the amount you are overdrawn each day. Where you go overdrawn without an agreement or where you use special services, such as copy statements, we will make a charge. This guide explains how these charges work, and when they will apply. If you want to use a service that we haven?t listed, we?ll tell you the cost of that service before you give us the go-ahead?. 3. There is no breach of contract; the charge cannot therefore be a penalty, consequently there is no requirement that the charge be a pre-estimate of the Banks loss. 4. The customer is given advance warning of the charges being imposed; statements show the charges, if any, the customer has incurred during the course of a month, and which will appear as debits on the following months?s statements. Customers are warned by letter when they go overdrawn or over their agreed limit without arrangement with the Bank. (NO...The customer is told by letter that they have insufficient funds and that it will incur in a service charge of XX and when it will go out of their account) If the customer fails to remedy the position, and payments such as standing orders and direct debits are refused then again the customer is warned by letter. (Again... the customer is told how much this mistake is going to cost them and when this money will come out of their account) 5. The charges are fair and reasonable, and it is denied that they are unlawful. 6. The customer is notified of the charges in plain intelligible language at the conclusion of the contract, and on each monthly statement. The charges are terms which relate to the price payable by the customer for a service provided by the Bank, and pursuant to Rgulation 6 of the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999,are not subject to the assessment of fairness. 7. In the premises: I have not received a Questionair to fill out form the court. What should I do now? How do I prepare for this? I have not got a court date either? When will that happen? Any advise? I am nervous. Many thanks, Kenbostero:???:

Hello again! I received this letter on saturday from the Head of Added Value Accounts from Lloyds. Dear Mrs.XXXX, We have been looking back at the Added Value current account you used to have with us, and realise that we owe you an apology and a refund. The purpose of this letter is to explain what has happened and what we are doing to put it right. Your account had entitled you to an interest-free zone within your overdraft. Through a process review we have identified that we did not set this up for you, so you have paid interest and charges you should not have. To put things right quickly for you we will be making a refund of interest and charges. A refund of £74.04 will be paid in your account by 17th May 2007. To work out your refund we've gone back through our system records fro your account. This includes 5.39% interest (annually) from the day the charge went onto your account up to 17th May 2007. I hope I have managed to explain everything clearly for you, but if you have any questions please call us on xxxx... The lines are open from 8AM - 8PM, blah, blah, blah. We will be more than happy to help. Sincerely, Head of Added Value Accounts Now....while I think it is good of them to rectify a mistake. I wonder if this is a tactic. They have not told me the date they took that money out of my account. They are also paying me interest of 5.39%, I thought they should be paying me interest of 8%. I wonder if their lawyers know about this letter and how would this affect their defence |(which I have not seen yet) or how would this affect my defence of the claim. Should I send a copy of this letter to the court? I am claiming £523.08 in charges plus £65.40 interest at 8%, plus the court fee of £80. Should I write a letter to the head of added value accounts telling him that I want interest rate to be 8%? To many questions I have. I don't want to be unprepared but I don't really know how to prepare myself for this battle. The fact that they have acknowledge the claim and are going to defend it tells me that this is going to be battle and I don't really want to be taken down by these people. Sorry that this is a bit long. But thank you for all your help. Kenbostero