NatWest OD facility letters

[Guest]

will do. like you, will be doing a complaint re their conduct re an o/d re difficulties. also referencing bcobs etc. ie 5.1.1, 5.1.4 Principle 6, Lending Code, cca, etc.

[pj2017]

Ford, you may be interested in what is happening.

 

After applying for but not getting my SAR details and asking for an interest freeze, I got back a reply telling me charges are frozen, but not interest. Then I noticed that charges had been applied again.

 

So I emailed again, asking why a £48 charge had been put on my account, when I had been told I am not eligible for charges, and pointing out my SAR details are still not with me, despite being signed for on October 17th. And then I asked again about freezing the interest, this time with copious reference to COBS.

 

The lady told me by email on the 8th that she was hoping to complete her reply to me that day - but I have still received no email or letter from her.

 

But I did notice that today they refunded the £48 charge in my account - and put in a further £100. I am expecting a letter tomorrow or this week about it. I shall be interested to see what the £100 related to - maybe a gesture of good will owing to the fact that the SAR is delayed, or for taking so long over my complaint, or to refund some earlier interest payments or something.

 

But anyway, the refunds put my account £42 below my overdraft limit - so, hoping that they have frozen interest, I could be home and dry - even if they haven't frozen interest, I am still pleased to see them put £148 in my account today!

[Mike_hawk]

Hi pj

 

Sorry, never did get around to drafting something BCOB related for you, but then you seem to be doing OK with your understanding of it

 

I would imagine the £100.00 is a goodwill gesture and it will be hoping to close the complaint. I think I'd be pushing for a little more from it and pursuing a s7 DPA claim for the SAR if it doesn't comply by day 40.

[Guest]

cheers for update pj2. sounds good.

will be sending out complaint this week. similar to yours; temp finan diffs repeatedly advised, short term interest freeze measure requested, no freeze, interest took it over limit, then was in collections before could blink, bank refused to discuss an arrangement, now gone to a dca (will not be communicating with them).

[jamesbond]

hi mike, i would like to make a claim against the natwest for sar timeline failure under s7dpa, how would i go about this and what should i seek in recompense?

[pj2017]

Sorry, the SAR was signed for Sept 17th - it is already well overdue. But all I really want is freezing of interest - if they do that I might forgt about the SAR.

[pj2017]

hi mike, i would like to make a claim against the natwest for sar timeline failure under s7dpa, how would i go about this and what should i seek in recompense?

 

James I think you can only get your costs in recompense - but you can force them to find the SAR materials and send them to you.

[jamesbond]

thanks pj for the info, shame as i would so like to give them some problems.

[Guest]

can get 'compensation' (from the bank following complaint) for the inconvenience and their 'mistake'. 250 in that eg mentioned before. depends on the circumstances.

Edited November 12, 2012 by Ford

[jamesbond]

that sounds good ford, if i could just help to stop them messing around with peoples sars it would be a step forward..i have read of loads that have not been complied with.

[Mike_hawk]

Templates are on consumerwiki for s.7 claim, you would be claiming damage and in some cases distress although I'm not overly confident that the latter is free from risk.

 

http://www.consumerwiki.co.uk/index.php/Data_Protection_Act:_Non-Compliance

[jamesbond]

thanks mike will read through

[pj2017]

1. I got a letter from NatWest refusing to stop interest - the say applying interest is fully in line with their fairness responsibilities, but confirm that the £100 they put in my account was compensation for my having to repeatedly raise complaints with them.

 

2. I received my SAR details - I wondered what the "parcel" would contain when a delivery arrived. To say I'm disappointed would be an understatement. It is a few printouts, but not everything I asked for.

 

2 pages - explanation of the banks' codes.

next page - my address and the date my next statement is due

next page - the fact that my statements are electronic and not paper and my email address

next 2 pages - the interest rates and limits on my overdraft as at 24 Oct

next page - symbols and codes

next page - account limit in force

next 3 pages - mostly blank, showing they haven't got my passport number or nationality or graduation date

next page - phone numbers, showing they don't have my current mobile number!!!

next page - customer account relationship - just a page showing me to be £14 over the OD limit

next 2 pages - a photograph of a handwritten letter to their collections centre by me on Sept 17

next page - a holding letter from them on Oct 5 saying "we are dealing with your request"

next page -a holding letter from them on Oct 17 saying "thank you for your patience"

final page - alit of loans I've had showing they don't know if I had PPI taken out on some historic loans

 

That's it - nothing from 1990, when the account was opened. No overdraft facility letters. Nothing to prove any contract exists between us. No transcript of audio conversations. In fact, very little information of any type, other than that their computer system says the date of first relationship is 1 Oct 1990, I owe £3164, and the interest rate is 18%, and my address.

 

What should I do about this SAR which does not contain the SAR details I asked for?

[jamesbond]

hi pj2, its appalling how these banks are alowed to get away with this diabolical treatment of there past and present customers and are allowed to dictate peoples credit records without any redress..

 

it is wrong that the only recourse that gets compensation and action is the courts and this is daunting for the majority hence being played upon by these unscrupulous bankers.

 

i feel its time the ico was given more leveredge to fine and award compensation to customers wronged by this mistreatment, and time the fos got some work done and reduced the handling times to 14 days...not up to 18 months as some cases have taken

 

To allow the bank to make any decisions on a case such as yours whilst they are not holding the full case details and legally required documentation is so so wrong, i just hope someone who has more knowledge in how to go forward with this can assist, as they need sorting out!!!

 

i would certainly get another letter in asking for the exact details you require within 14 days as this will stand up in your favour should it arrive in court, and nothing is provided.

Edited November 15, 2012 by jamesbond

[pj2017]

I am very unsatisified with Alison Acton at RBS' reply to me and the fact that I did not get proper SAR materials through so I emailed Gary Stewart, head of compliance, at RBS again just now, copying in Alison Acton:

 

Dear Mr Stewart,

 

I am writing re: NatWest account XXXXXXX. I have been in unfruitful email correspondence with Alison Acton in your office, who has sent me a number of deliberately evasive responses, in particular, refusing to consider my request for freezing of interest in the light of the

Conduct of Business Sourcebook (she flippantly states that refusal to freeze interest is in line with your fairness requirements - I want

the non-flippant response). And in particular - please read the following sentence repeatedly until understood - I asked her to respond specifically on whether NatWest's refusal to comply with the law on data Subject Access Requests constitutes unfair management of an account. She has at no point replied to this, although I made it crystal clear that I was seeking a specific reply on this point.

 

Look - if this account goes to court, presumably you will rely on certain legal documents to make a claim against me. I have made clear

that I don't recall signing anything to set up an overdraft facility, that I don't recall agreeing for a debt already built up to be subject

to continual unilaterally varied interest charges, that I don't recall agreeing that interest could be charged on interest (bearing in mind

that a large proportion of my alleged debt is precisely interest on interest), that I don't recall agreeing that the account could not be

closed down without a nil balance, but could be kept artificially open by NatWest while dormant with respect to my usage, while the ONLY transactions on the account are you interest and charges, refunds of charges and things like that. When did I agree to such blatantly

unfair contractual terms? When did I agree to ANY contractual terms?

 

So I do not know what legal documents you would rely on in court, and I submitted a data SAR request, asking, specifically for EVERYTHING you have on me, including printed, electronic and audio materials, to include but not be limited to, account opening contracts and overdraft facility letters. I asked for this specifically to level up the playing field between NatWest and me so that I would have a copy of all the documents you are relying on, and so that I could see what legal basis, IF ANY, there is for your interest charges and your payment demands.

 

How could I defend myself in court without them? How can I even tell if you have any legal basis to your demands without seeing these

things? Alison Acton has consistently evaded comment on this. To be quite honest, I do not believe NatWest has a policy of complying with the Conduct of Business Sourcebook at all - as evidenced by Alison Acton's handling of my complaint.

 

I am writing to you, Gary Stewart, to ask you, as head of compliance, to ensure that I receive the SAR materials I have requested and which are overdue - or to write off any and all claimed debts that you are purporting to pursue me for and in addition to refund all interest

charges that have been applied to my account at any and every point since October 1st 1990.

 

What I received by courier today by way of a farcical pretended reply to my SAR request was:

 

2 pages - explanation of the banks' codes

next page - my address and the date my next statement is due

next page - the fact that my statements are electronic and not paper and my email address

next 2 pages - the interest rates and limits on my overdraft as at 24 Oct

next page - symbols and codes

next page - account limit in force

next 3 pages - mostly blank, showing you haven't got my passport number or nationality or graduation date

next page - phone numbers

next page - customer account relationship - just a page claiming I am £14 over the OD limit

next 2 pages - a photograph of a handwritten letter to your collections centre by me on Sept 17

next page - a holding letter from the bank on Oct 5 saying "we are dealing with your request"

next page -a holding letter from the bank on Oct 17 saying "thank you for your patience"

final page - a list of loans I've had showing you don't know if I had PPI taken out on some historic loans

 

You have sent through very little information of any type, other than that your computer system says the date of first relationship is 1 Oct

1990, claims I owe £3164, claims the interest rate is 18%, and has my address.

 

I have been a customer since 1990 and I **specifically asked for everything the bank has on me**, so you must have much more on me,

including electronically stored data, printed letters and transcripts of audio conversations. I reserve the right to sue you in the small

claims court if you do not send the information through. You remain in breach of my SAR request - the things you sent through do not fulfil it in any way. I asked for EVERYTHING - and sent a £10 postal order for it - including **any account opening agreements (if any), and all overdraft facility letters**. Does the fact that these have not been sent to me show that NatWest has no record of any contract between me and them (and if so, why are you pursuing me)?

 

What can you personally do to ensure that NatWest complies with the SAR request? If you agree there is no record of any agreement or

agreements between NatWest and me, please cancel the alleged debt and refund all interest charges applied to this account since October 1st 1990. Wouldn't it just be simpler for you to comply with the law and send through the SAR details I am entitled to? How can you take this account to court without having sent these things through?

[jamesbond]

does anyone know , if the bank have admitted they have no facility letter or account opening paperwork as it has been destroyed due to the passage of time, if they are allowed to file defaults or any other info with the credit agencies, as they do not have agreements?

surely this must apply in pjs case as well as mine?

Edited November 23, 2012 by jamesbond

[pj2017]

Some new developments:

 

as I explained in November, I received an SAR reply (note: SAR request signed for on September 17th) that just listed basic info (my address and things like that), without overdraft facility letters or anything of the kind.

 

I received a second SAR reply dated 28th November that gave a summary of one phone call and a photocopy of two letters I sent the bank years ago.

 

Neither of these replies gives me a full data set for my account - and in particular, there are no overdraft facility letters, credit agreements, terms and conditions, account opening agreements, diary event history for the account etc.

 

But I have also received another reply from the Group Executive Office in response to my complaint (see message of November 15th above), refunding a further £143 in interest, but stating that I will not be getting overdraft facility letters or anything of that kind in response to my SAR request. The letter says:

 

The bank should have responded to your Subject Access Request within the 40 day time limit and I am very sorry that this did not happen. The bank has ben dealing with a large volume of requests and this has contributed to the delay in providing a copy of your information to you. While I note your comments and views, I do not agree that the failure to provide your information within the 40 day period is in any way a refusal to comply with the law. The delay is regrettable, and I do not agree that this constitutes unfair management of your account.

 

I am sorry that you found my comments about our commitment to treating customers fairly to be flippant, as this was certainly not my intention. We have a responsibility and a commitment to ensure that all customers are treated in a fair way. Of course this is an extremely broad statement, but it includes applying the same terms and conditions to customers who have exceeded their overdraft facility, and providing fair complaints and claims handling to all customers.

 

It is clear that you have been expecting the bank to provide you with information in your SAR that has not arrived. I am sorry that the information you have received has not met your expections, but I have been assured that you have been provided with everything that is available and that you are entitled to receive. Information is gathered by various units within the bank, and sent to you separately by each team and I understand that you should have received, in addition to the information sent to you by our SAR team, information from our Credit Card team and also information from our Credit Managemetn Services team.

 

You have asked specifically for a copy of applications and agreements that may relate to account XXXXXX. Our Group Records Management Policy allows for the retention of six years of personal data to be held and this is in line with the Data Protection Act (1998) guidelines. As your account was opened in 1990, we would not keep the application form as the information that was provided at that time woudl not necessarily be up to date (for example, in regards to marriage state, occupation, income, dependents, address). Another principle of the Data Protection Act is that the data we hold is up to date and relevant, and information provided more than 20 years ago is unlikely to be up to date or relevant.

 

The bank is not able to provide you with a copy of overdraft facility letters, change to interest rate letters or any other letters that are generated by the bank's computer systems, as we do not retain a copy of computer generated letters. You have asked for a copy of the original Terms and Conditions of the account but Terms and Conditions do not form part of your personal data under Section 7 of the Data Protection Act (1998). You also mention wanting a complete copy of the 'Diary Event History' for the account but we do not keep such a diary.

 

You mention that the overdrawn balance on your account is made up of interest and charges but the transaction history does not support this claim. As Rebecca Mair said in her letter of 19 October 2012 the outstanding balance on your account has been run up through general account use and although you have exceeded the overdraft limit and cannot use the account because no funds are available, this does not make the account dormant.

 

Since you raised your concerns on 27 September 2012 interest totalling £143.84 has been applied to your account. Charges that were applied in error since March 2012 have been refunded. A goodwill payment of £100 was applied to your account on 12 November 2012 in recognition of the trouble you have been put to in bringing your concerns to our attention. As a further goodwill gesture, I have arranged for your account to be credited with £143.84 to refund the interest amount that has been applied while your concerns have been investigated by this office. Any further interest that is accrued on the overdrawn balance of the account will stand.

 

As I said in my letter of 9 November 2012, it is important that you contact our Collections Team in order to agree the way forward. Please contact them as a matter of priority on telephone number 0845 303 9015. Our Collections team will ask you to provide them with up to date details of your income and outgoings and your repayment proposals, and they will review this information and discuss this with you, in order to agree a suitable plan for the repayment of your outstanding debt.

 

If as they state I have received absolutely everything then they don't really have much information on me!! I specifically asked them (see post 115 here) what documents they would rely on in court, and it seems they don't have any agreements or overdraft letters or anything that would show that I have agreed to unfair terms and conditions, which I have repeatedly pointed out to them I never agreed to. Including unilateral variation of interest rates on an already built up debt, the inability to free interest or close down an account with a negative balance etc. I really don't know how they can proceed on the basis of zero legally actionable information regarding this account?

 

As a result of months of emailing Stephen Hester's office - I have achieved 1) an end to charges; 2) a refund of all charges applied since the account went to the collections team in March; 3) a £100 goodwill payment; and 4) a refund of all interest (£143) charged while I have been in correspondence with them. But they have not agreed to freeze further interest. Nevertheless, I have got something for my trouble.

Edited December 4, 2012 by pj2

[jamesbond]

hi pj ,

typical bank response, we have done nothing, you are not having any more info, you are wrong and we are right.

 

I am in the same position but have received no sar info for 4 months despite being referred to group customer relations..

my debt was written off but i am challenging the default as it is 1800 quid with 1300 pounds of it compounded charges.

The bank have admitted that no paperwoprk held as its beyond six years and gave me the finger to put it bluntly!!

i am filing with court re the sar as i cannot contest anything as i have no paperwork, and i am unable to go further.

like you i am dissapointed as there seems no where to turn to!!

As i see it we are both challenging the same thing here in that no paperwork is held by the bank and as they have no paperwork do they have any right to claim the debt or file any info with the credit ref agencies. This needs challenging in my books.

one of my credit entries was incorrect and they sent me 75 quid to make me feel better, makes me laugh in that they stuff up and we bail them out with our tax money and they give us a bit of our own money back for there mistakes they made...wonderful people.!!!

good luck with yours and keep us posted

[pj2017]

James bond, I am hoping RobCAG who beat NatWest in court re: overdraft facility letters can respond to this thread.

[jamesbond]

Lets hope he gives you some good advice ... are you gonna pay up or contest it? i contested it thats why i got the default and they had to write it off as i wouldnt pay them.

 

i hope robcag guides you and helps you deal withese clowns ...

[pj2017]

Lets hope he gives you some good advice ... are you gonna pay up or contest it? i contested it thats why i got the default and they had to write it off as i wouldnt pay them.

 

i hope robcag guides you and helps you deal withese clowns ...

 

Well, I can't afford to pay at the moment, and there is nothing to contest, as it hasn't gone to court yet and there has been no default yet. As I am self-employed, it is difficult to say if my finances will pick up -but I only asked them to suspend interest for 6 months - it would be better off for them and for me if I can make some money and get on top of things. Surely they must have guessed from my emails to them that if this goes to court I will be looking for strict proof from them of a contract between us agreeing to unfair conditions - I don't believe I agreed to any of this and they have said they don't have the original details either.

 

In these circumstances, if I were them, I would have just taken a decision to suspend the interest for 6 months and give me a chance - as it is I have been in constant correspondence with them for 3 months, and they have ended up by cancelling the interest over these months anyway - so refusing to do so hasn't got them anywhere so far - although they have told me that is it in terms of suspending interest. If they were going to put £243 in my account for goodwill eventually anyway over the 3 months, why didn't they just create goodwill in the first place by giving me 3 mths interest free back when I wrote to them in September, instead of turning the communications into a legalistic debate?

[Guest]

quite, to be fair why did'nt they just freeze the interest in the first place. thing is majority of people prob don't complain, so they 'get away' with things.

seems they have effectively put you back to the beginning, but it seems from what they say that if no arrangement is made with collections then things will continue ie interest will again accrue?

Edited December 4, 2012 by Ford

[Guest]

re robcags case, it seems that he did rely as a 'key' on the fact that 'they' said that they could not provide copies of the facility letters that they mentioned in WS even though it was 'standard practice' to send them. that was re a summary judgment application which was refused. and, they later discontinued. but, it seems to have since resurfaced?

[pj2017]

Well, as far as I see it, if they don't have a copy of any agreements, there is no contract and no enforceable debt. At the very least, in such circumstances, freezing interest is reasonable - as I particularly object to the fact that once a large debt has been run up for whatever reason, you can't close the account and just pay off that debt - but they insist on the right to keep the account open and put interest on forever - I don't think I ever signed anything agreeing to that - and they can't show I did either...

[pj2017]

It seems to me these banks just refuse to comply with the SAR request. Did you notice that Terms and Conditions were, according to their letter, not covered by the SAR request - but then I want to know if I ever agreed to any - and this is the bit they are cagey on. They would not have put £243 in my account unless they knew that there was something legally less than straightforward about their repayment demands.