Santander refusing to cancel CPA to Wonga

[nutter192]

I currently have a Wonga loan that I am having financial difficulties in paying back. So I contacted Halifax and Santander to inform them to cancel the CPA that was attached to my accounts. Halifax haven't got back to me yet, but Santander have. Here is the relevant text as below:

 

I note from your letter dated 29 October 2013 that you have instructed Santander to stop any payments to Wonga from leaving your account.

 

I would like to explain that in order for Santander to place a stop of a debit card payment we require a minimum of 24 hours notice, the exact amount of the payment, the date the payment is due to debit the account and the merchant's name.

 

If any of these details change we cannot guarantee to stop the payment as we are unable to 'block' a debit from an individual merchant, we can only try and block a payment for a specific amount.

 

I can confirm that Santander are currently looking at ways to improve their service as recurring debit card transactions are becoming a problem for many customer's. In the meantime, we do recomment that customer's attempt to cancel any subscriptioon they have entered into with a merchant while also contacting us to try and block the payments.

 

I would therefore request that you contact your customer services department with the information required to stop any further dated card payments to Wonga.

 

I hope I have explained the reason for my decision and that is offers a fair resolution to the issue you have raised. (Who are they trying to kid!)

 

I couldn't have made more clearer that I wished to cancel the CPA when I wrote to them. Shall I send another letter back quoting the regulations of the Payments Services Regulations 2009 in more detail? Also, I'm definitly asking for compensation for dealing with the matter on this one as well.

Edited November 27, 2013 by nutter192

[renegadeimp]

Santander is wrong. All you need to do is give them at least 1 hour before close of business the working day before the transaction is due.

 

Time to get the FCA involved as they are coming down on banks hard.

[Nao]

Don't bother sending letters to banks requesting to cancel CPAs, go to a branch in person and refuse to leave until you have written confirmation that they have cancelled it (preferably signed by the Branch Manager to reduce the risk of the Bank acting up later).

[nutter192]

I sent another letter to Santander explicitly quoting section 55 of the Payment Regulations.

 

Santander have replied with the following:

 

Having reviewed the circumstances surrounding your formal complaint, I am sorry to learn that you feel Santander is not adhering to the Payment Services Regulations 2009 with regard to future card payments. I appreciate the time and trouble you have taken in highlighting the relevant sections pertaining to the consent and withdrawal of consent in particular section 55. I am sorry that you feel that we have attempted to mislead you surrounding the future card payment process within our response dated 25th November 2013.

 

... I respetfully advise that we cannot guarantee that a payment will be stopped without all the relevant details being supplied within a minimum of 24 hours notice.

 

... I am unable to uphold your request for compensation of £100.00.

 

I am going to write to them one more time stating the FCA regulations and intention to involve the Financial ombudsman with an increased request for compensation etc. Any other advice that you can provide me with will be appreciated.

[renegadeimp]

Time to get the fos and fca involved. Theyve basically admitted to breaking regulations.

 

Dont send them another letter. Go straight to the regulators.

[d123c]

i have had the same nightmare with Santander over the past few days. when asking to cancel a continuous payment authority they ask for the name of the company, the date and amount of the transaction. then they tell you that if anything changes such as company name etc then they can't guarantee it will be blocked. for example they would class these as different: "Wonga" & "Wonga.com". it appears Santander are doing everything they can to make it difficult to cancel these CPAs. i phoned up to cancel two of them in Nov. payment was due on 15th Nov and on the date the transactions were cancelled. i thought great it worked. then it came to december... one of the transactions were blocked and one was not. i was out of pocket by £408. it was out of my available balance on 18th Dec. i phoned up to ask for a refund however was told i could not do anything until it has 'physically left my account'. only today (21st) has it shown on my statement. just got off the phone to them now. a summary of the call: spoke to advisor and explained that £408 has been taken after i have told them to cancel the CPA. she looked at my notes and told me that since the value is different to that blocked in november then thats why its gone through. i told her that the regulations state that if i cancel a CPA then the bank must block all payments and refund immediately if a payment is allowed to go through. her response was that its Santander policy that they can only guarantee to stop the exact payments i request. i asked for a refund but told that was not possible. all she could do was raise a complaint that would take 5 working days to look at. i asked to speak to a manager. manager came on and just said the same as the other advisor. i told her that i believe Santander is not following regulations and her response was, "I'm sorry you feel that way. i'll add it to your complaint". she told me she would get a specialist team to look at it and should hear back on monday or tuesday - i'm thinking thats very unlikely but we shall see. I'm not £408 down just before xmas all because of the incompetence of Santander. not happy!

[renegadeimp]

You need to get in touch with the FCA and FOS. Santander are well known for flouting regulation and the law.

[d123c]

thanks! this is all new to me. do i have to wait for santander to deal with my complaint or should i go to the fca straight away?

[renegadeimp]

Go to the fca and let them know. Inform the oft as well. When you make a formal complaint to the bank, they have 56 days to issue a final response. Then you can get the fos incolved.

[sillygirl1]

Don't forget that the OFT have already sanctioned payday lenders for this type of behaviour so you need to stress to them the importance of including Wonga in on the complaint.