Hi all, Following advice I found on this forum I recently sent a Notice of Appropriation letter to First Direct to make sure they don't take my benefits to pay bank charges. To put all this in context, this is an account I've had for about 18 years. I haven't had an overdraft facility or credit card for most of that time because I don't want or need either of them. FD have always been fine with me while I was working and my wages were being paid in every month, but since I became too ill to work about a year ago their attitude seems to have changed and the gloves are off. My account is currently in credit, although I was recently charged £10 for a bounced direct debit. The reply goes as follows: This is unhelpful on so many levels. To begin with, I sent a detailed breakdown of my incomings and outgoings to FD along with the Notice of Appropriation, and this already shows that I have no spare money and need every penny of my ESA for basic essentials. I really don't know what else they could need or want in this respect, unless it's a detailed breakdown of my shopping list to prove that the money I reserve for food actually does get spent on food. Next is the seven days notice they require before each credit and the payment it's to cover. I assume that therefore they want or expect me to write to or phone them (at my own expense) every two weeks when my ESA is due to arrive and let them know how I intend to spend it. That seems completely unreasonable to me. And then, after being unhelpful, they threaten me (twice) with closure of my account. A nice touch indeed. I could get angry about this, but there's no point. For some time I've been thinking of moving to a more ethical bank and this letter provoked me into finally doing it. I've already been on the phone to the Cooperative bank and opened a Cashminder account with them. They're fully aware of my situation and were quite understanding about it. As soon as all the details arrive and all my payments are transferred over, it's goodbye First Direct! P.S. Apologies for having a bit of a rant!

My dd went inadvertantly overdrawn early in June by forgetting to transfer money from her e-savings account into her current in time for her mobile phone direct debit, they wrote immediately setting out the charges for the unplanned overdraft use etc. dd has disabilities and her only income is means tested benefits plus DLA. On advice here I wrote a letter of appropriation to the bank in June, together with a letter from dd (which she took in and handed in by hand in person) giving permission for me to talk to the bank on her behalf as she has a severe receptive and expressive language disorder. Three weeks later a letter addressed to dd arrived asking her to call a named person and the local bank branch number and I attempted that number over 50 times and there was no reply. Yesterday the bank took two lots of bank charges from her account. Today I went in and they said they couldn't talk to me as there had been no identification with the letter giving dd's permission for them to speak to me. Bit surprised by that as dd had handed it in, in person herself and they had her ID so surely that should have been ok. I had ID on me today, photocard driving licence but they did not ask for any. However the lady did say that a letter of appropriation only works for future events such as going overdrawn and charges and that as dd had gone overdrawn already and had the notification of the charges that the letter of appropriation would not work in these circumstances as it would not cover a past event. Also that it would only work 'once' as a one off. Does a letter of appropriation only cover future events of going overdrawn and the notification of charges and not ones already happened but before the actual charges are implimented? This doesn't make sense to me as she would not ever know she was going to go overdrawn or she would stop it happening! dd has not gone overdrawn since and so that event was once at the beginning of June and here we are in August with the bank charges having written to the bank with a letter of appropriation in June. I complained about the lack of notification of the date of the charges and she said the amounts to be taken were written at the bottom of last months bank statement but nowhere did that say what date they would be taken. With her only income being benefits these charges could easily have caused her to be overdrawn again as she hadn't known when they were going to be taken! Thankfully she had enough money to cover them. I said to the lady about the appropriation and how dd needs her benefits for her living expenses and she said that she can see on the account that money has been used for treats and so is not just for living expenses. Does the evidence of 'treats' negate the effect of a letter of appropriation? Tbh I am thinking of giving up this fight, not sure where to go from here. I've tried to stop the charges being taken but totally failed and am hitting a brick wall.