You may wish to look at the Unfair Contracts Terms Act 1977 - paragraph below from one of the mortgage ERC claim cases... a fee levied requiring me to indemnify you against any commercial risk to yourself in offering me a reduced interest rate in order to attract my custom is also contrary to s.4 Unfair Contracts Terms Act 1977. I am confident that a court is likely to consider this clause to be unreasonable within s.11 of the said Act as a large commercial institution such as yourselves is in a far better placed position than me as a consumer to bear the burden of the vicissitudes of business

Do a summary and indexed documents! Make it as easy as possible for FOS to see whats happened, otherwise its likely the bored, underpaid employee who opens your envelope of documents will think 'No idea whats happened here, bin it is then' Best thing about FOS is that their decision would be binding on Northern Rock, but doen not limit your other options in any way.

Personally I would take this to the Financial Ombudsman Service Financial Ombudsman Service

Dont think you will get any further with anymore letters as there's not really much more to say -you know the arguments, its MCOL time! It should be allocated to the small claims so you wont be liable for their costs. Based on my own experience, your court fees will be approx £220, which you should get back when you win. I should have thought the fact it was only the 3 weeks till the end of the ERC period then you would have been charged nothing are a very good argument that its a penalty (if it reflected their costs, then the amount should decrease over time to zero, not be a lump sum one week and zero the next) Begs the question why you didnt wait another three weeks to redeem?? Anyway, good luck!

Humm, there must be an avenue of appeal on this one - new evidence prehaps if the charges review was to be disclosed??

Morning Fishy, good luck!

kingpro, would like to see them explain its for 'the income we should have earned' in court as they have no entitlement to this. Zoot is spot on with the defence to 'right to terminate' also worth mentioning that any right to terminate clause was varied and effectively put beyond your reach by the inclusion of the ERC clause and represents an unfair term under Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regs - have a look at Sarounia vs Simple response to defence

Sorry, settled for approx £2,750 including interest @ 8% and court fees

No admission of liability, but settled in full two weeks before the court date - redemption charge, interest @ 8% and court fees refunded. The girlfriend is very happy! (it was her redemption charge) The defendants solicitors were Eversheds and I note that a number of other cases where Eversheds are the acting for the defendant have gone to withing two weeks of the court date only to be settled - could it be that they believe they cannot win in court but are doing everything to deter people from pursuing their claims.... Keep going everyone!

Sorry, can someone clarify? Does the *Finished* really mean that this was settled out of court in Tillers favour? If so, fantastic result and surely strong evidencs that the mortgage companies are not confident about defending their charges..

s15 of the Supply of Goods and Services Act is the way to go. If the price for the connection/disconnection was not agreed in advance, then you should challenge them as to how they calculated the charge and why they consider it to be reasonable. If they ignore you, then its small claims time and they will have to justify it to a judge. As previously mentioned, if its approx. 20 hours work for an electrictian, then how can that possible be reasonable? I would write to them and point out their obligations under the Supply of Goods and Services Act and see if they will reconsider their charges. If that fails, send another letter threatening court action. Finally, lodge a claim in the small claims court.

Doh! Thanks (again) Zoot

Update time (have been rather busy moving house!) - in response to my slightly naughty Allocation Questionnaire - Section G, I received a copy of a rather haughty letter from Eversheds. The letter was addressed to the court and complained about my request in Section G for disclosure of their costs due to my breach - apparently I should know better, given that we are on the small claims track (I will point out to the judge on the day that I am only a layperson and provided the information with the best of intentions) Anyway, the letter from Evershesds described the request for a breakdown of costs as a non-issue as I was cleary exercising a right under the contract and they will supply a witness statement to support this(?????). I do remember reading a rebuttal of the 'exercising a right' argument, but cant find it anywhere - could someone help me out by posting a link? Thanks, Graeme

They will string it out for as long as possible - see my thread http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/mortgage-companies/34426-gc-standard-life-bank.html We have a court date on the 16th Jan, but lets see if they actually go to court (I am confident I will win if they do!)

Letter ready to go In connection with my recent sale of Flat 5 Chelsea House, my solicitor requested from you a copy of Chelsea House Management Company accounts for the last three years. You supplied the accounts to my solicitor, accompanied by an invoice for £117.50. I cannot imagine how retrieving, photocopying and posting three sets of accounts can possibly have taken anyone more than 20 minutes (making your charge equivalent to an hourly rate of £352.50) hence I believe you must have made some mistake with the invoice. I consider a charge of £117.50 for this service to be grossly inflated and I remind you of your obligations under the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982, which state that someone providing a service must do it: With reasonable care and skill In a reasonable time if you haven’t specified a completion date For a reasonable price if this hasn’t been agreed in advance This means the trader providing the service has a duty of care and should complete the job in good time and at a reasonable cost, even if the deadline for completion or a final price were not agreed in advance. In order to determine a reasonable price for any service, the best way to do this is to get quotes from other companies for the same job. I have checked with Companies House and they would charge £5 to open an account and £3 for mailing each copy of the accounts, a total charge of £14. The fact that Companies House would do this job for a much lower charge is proof enough in my opinion that your charge is unreasonable under the provisions of the aforementioned act. Accordingly, I enclose a cheque for £30 in full and final settlement.

I'm selling my flat and my solicitor requested the last three years management company accounts (Chelsea House Management Company) from the company which we employ (Wren Properties Ltd) to do all the accounting and property manintenance. The accounts were supplied along with an invoice for £117.50 All the management company had to do was photocopy three sets of 15 page accounts, documents which they hold in their office, and pop them in the post. I estimate this would take someone about 20mins, so their charge equates to an hourly rate of £352.50!!! Now Companies House would have supplied paper copies of the same accounts for £3 a set including postage. The price was not agreed in advance and per the Supply of Goods and Services Act, if a price was not agreed in advance, the price for a service has to be reasonable - anyone think £117.50 is reasonable?? I have instructed my solicitor not to pay the charges, but what else can I do?

Post up the defence and let us all have a look at it, wont be able to adivse much otherwise....

H, could you post up what details you have on the charge from your contract - this may enable more people to help... (there must be something!)

H, a fixed rate mortgage can be considered to have an embedded derivative product, an interest rate swap. It is possible to value an interest rate swap using future predicted interest rates (yield curves) and knowledge of the two interest rates which are being swapped and the principal (ie. your outstanding mortgage). Barclays may have done this (I very much doubt it) and should have no reason for not providing you with copies of their calculations if the charge was a genuine pre-estimate. If you're written to them and they wont disclose their calculations, this brings us right back to the situation the majority of people on here have found themselves in - the mortgage provider will not disclose how the charge was calculated so as to represent a genuine pre-estimate ot their loss and we end up claiming through the courts. I would suggest the fact the charge was not transparent at the outset will give rise to many more avenues for disputing this charge, although my knowledge is limited in this respect.

Zoot you are a star! Thank you very much, now got copies of all the cases I need. Just waiting for confirmation of my court date through the post - would love it if the judge has actually ordered disclosure of Std Life's calculations!

Heard nothing for a while, so called the court today - AQ was processed yesterday and the date has been set for Jan 16th 2007 in Manchester I'm confident I can handle things in court, but just to clarify there is no problem with me representing my girlfriend in the small claims court? (she really doesnt want to speak at all and would rather not go at all if possible) Also, is there an online copy of Campbell Discount vs Bridge anywhere? (for court bundle)

From what I've read on other threads, I cant see there would be a problem in adding these details to you AQ - good luck with it!

Just a thought, this paragraph at the end of the comma article is this little gem In 1998, Lord Hoffman ruled in the House of Lords: “The meaning of words is a matter of dictionaries and grammars; the meaning of the documents is what the parties using those words against the relevant background would reasonable have been understood to mean. The background may not merely enable the reasonable man to choose between the possible meanings of the words which are ambiguous but even (as occasionally happens in ordinary life) to conclude that the parties must, for whatever reason, have used the wrong words or syntax.” Anyone know how I can go about finding out what case this came from? Seems it would be a useful to convince a court to look at the substance of a clause (eg. the old 'its a charge for exercising a right to terminate' defence)

Sounds like a scare tactic The counterclaim for costs is total rubbish, goes against the Civil Procedure Rules and they cannot rely on a clause in a contract which is no longer in force. Have a look at 'These guys dont get it , do they' thread and I think Sarounia may have encountered something similar You should also inform the solicitor you will be making a formal complaint to the Law Society for intimidatory and disingenuous behaviour

Filled in the AQ and sent to court last week Included the following in the 'Other information' section. Probably a little naughty, but I though anything which draws the judges attention to Std Life's failure to provide a breakdown of their charges has to be a good thing... The claimant has repeatedly asked the defendant to provide the claimant with details of how their charge was calculated to represent a genuine estimate of their loss. The defendant has failed to respond to this request and thus the claimant is of the opinion that no genuine pre-estimate took place. It is further submitted by the claimant that the defendant’s failure to provide such information is for the reason that such information would reveal that the disputed contractual term is in fact a disproportionate penalty. Had the defendant been able to demonstrate that the charge was indeed a liquidated damages clause, and they have had ample opportunity to do so, the claimant would not have needed to initiate these proceedings. It is thus respectfully submitted by the claimant that an order to disclose this information is made so as to bring an expeditious termination to the proceedings. Attached are copies of the claimant’s correspondence with the defendant prior to the initiation of legal proceedings. The requests for details of how their charges were calculated are highlighted in yellow