Claiming beyond 6 yrs - important new information!!!

[MacBoy]

You didn't make that clear in your post. Your next step, if you intend to fight on, is to prepare your legal arguments and court case using the information and procedures outlined in the library area. Prepare a Letter Before Action.

 

Although tedious, working your way through this thread is a good way to start if you haven't done so already.

[PI Guy]

This was my original letter to them but other than reiterate what else should I say in light of their response?

 

 

 

Dear Sir/Madam,

 

ACCOUNT NUMBER:

 

My Request:

I am writing to ask you to refund to me the charges which you have levied from my accounts over the years 1995 to 1997.

 

I now understand that the regime of fees which you have been applying to my account in relation to direct debit refusals, exceeding overdraft limits and so forth are unlawful at Common Law and contrary to consumer regulations. If you say that they are not, then will you please demonstrate this by letting me have a full breakdown of the costs to which you have been put by as a result of my breaches, in order to reassure me that your charges really do reflect your costs.

 

Additionally, it has now been confirmed that your particularly high level of penalties are considered to be unfair per se by the OFT who reported on the 5th April 2006 and are therefore presumed to be unlawful in the absence of specific proof to the contrary.

 

Your responsibilities:

I would draw your attention to the terms of the contract which you agreed to at the time that I opened my accounts. It is an implied term of that contract that you would conduct yourselves lawfully and in a manner which complies with UK law.

 

I am frankly shocked that you have operated my account in this way as I had always reposed confidence in your integrity and expertise.

 

I consider that your repeated representations that your charges are fair and reasonable are deceptive and that they have deceived me into agreeing to pay them. Your concealment of the true nature of your charges has prevented me from asserting my right until now.

What I require

Current Account : I calculate that you have taken £1376.50 plus £1274.53 which you have charged me in overdraft interest for the sum which you have taken. Total £2651.03. I enclose a schedule of the charges which I am claiming with this letter.

 

Pathfinder Account 2: I calculate that you have taken £620.50 plus £545.62 which you have charged me in overdraft interest for the sum which you have taken. Total £1166.12. I enclose a schedule of the charges which I am claiming with this letter.

 

The grand total for both these two accounts is £3817.15.

 

My targets to resolve this matter

I hope that you will enter into a sincere dialogue with me about this matter and I am writing this letter to you on the assumption that you will prefer to do this than merely respond with standard letters and leaflets.

 

I will give you 14 days to reply to me accepting, unconditionally, my request in principle and letting me know a date by which I will receive payment.

 

If you dispute that I am entitled to a refund of these charges, I request that you forward within the above mentioned time scale, a copy of the Terms and Conditions that were in force at the time my account was opened, and any subsequent amendments to those Terms and Conditions. These are requested under CPR Pre-Action Protocol 4.6©, and failure to provide them will be brought to the attention of the court, should it be necessary to commence a county court action.

 

If you do not respond, or you do not respond positively, within this time period, I shall send you a letter before action giving you a further 14 days in which to reflect. I believe that these targets are more than sufficient for a large company such as yours with dedicated staff and departments.

 

After that, there will be no further communication from me and I shall issue a claim at the expiry of the second deadline.

[MacBoy]

There is no need to reiterate any of what you have already written. As I said in my previous post, you have received a negative response from them and now it's time to pepare for court. If you are going to continue to pursue them for the pre-6 years charges then you need to research your argument. Use the FAQs, this thread, the libraries and the templates sections of this site for guidance.

 

The first step in this is the preparation of your Letter Before Action. Templates for these are here. Adapt to your requirements.

[PI Guy]

i am doing this letter now and am sending it out today. Thanks for your help and advice.

[MacBoy]

You're welcome, PI Guy - if you'd like some one to review it before you send, PM me and I'll take a look myself and perhaps get a second opinion from a Helper or Mod. Or alternatively, post a draft on here (less personal details) and others can comment.

[PI Guy]

MY DRAFT;

LETTER BEFORE ACTION

Dear Sir/Madam,

 

ACCOUNT NUMBER:

 

I am very disappointed that you have failed to respond to my letter of the 19th July 2007 in a satisfactory manner.

 

I now understand that the regime of 'fees' which you have been applying to my account in relation to direct debit refusals, exceeding overdraft limits and so forth are unlawful at Common Law and contrary to consumer regulations.

 

I would draw your attention to the terms of the contract which you agreed to at the time that I opened my account. It is an implied term of that contract that you would conduct yourselves lawfully and in a manner which complies with UK law.

 

I am frankly shocked that you have operated my account in this way as I had always reposed confidence in your integrity and expertise.

 

Current Account: I calculate that you have taken £1376.50 plus £1296.34 which you have charged me in overdraft interest for the sum which you have taken. Total £2672.84.

 

Pathfinder Account: I calculate that you have taken £620.50 plus £555.45 which you have charged me in overdraft interest for the sum which you have taken. Total £1175.95.

 

The grand total for both these two accounts is £3848.79.

 

I am enclosing a copy of the schedule of the charges which I am claiming. I have already sent you a copy of this in my original letter of the 19th July 2007.

I require repayment in full of this money. If you do not comply fully within 14 days then I shall begin a claim against you for the full amount plus interest plus my costs and without further notice.

 

You are also reminded of my request that you forward a copy of the Terms and Conditions that were in force at the time my account was opened, and any subsequent amendments to those Terms and Conditions. These are requested under CPR Pre-Action Protocol 4.6©, and your continued failure to provide them will be brought to the attention of the court, should it be necessary to commence a county court action.

 

Furthermore, I shall submit a Consumer Credit Act 1974 complaint to the OFT upon the basis that you have failed to comply with the OFT's direction of 5 April 2006 and are therefore not a 'fit and proper person' to hold a consumer credit license under the 1974 Act. If you do not understand what this means then seek advice from your legal department.

 

Yours faithfully,

[MacBoy]

Looks good to me.

 

Mac

[groovycaz]

I don't need their statements as I have them. I sent them my standard letter asking them to repay etc and that was their response.

Hi PI, you and I are more or les in the same position with the Co-op, mines a business account and I also have my statements, after they told me 3 times that they dont have to refund me more than 6 years, they then asked me for copies of my banking statements showing the charges back to 1996, they recieved them a couple of weeks ago and requested to the courts for a pre-lim hearing, regarding the limitation issues, so was expecting a date for a court heafing when I recieved instead a notice to say the court had stayed my claim, my objection has just gone in and a copy sent to their solicitor, so the wait begins..Gc

[PI Guy]

what was your objection?

[groovycaz]

Hi PI Guy, ive objected to the court for staying my claim, it was not the bank who requested the claim be stayed, the court made that decision while awaiting the test case, as its a business claim,ive objected that the UTCCR are not relevant to business claims and applied that my case can proceed...Gc

[MacBoy]

(Update cross-posted from my thread)

 

For clarity - this means that I have now succeeded in recovering statements going back to 1987 from Halifax Plc!

 

Email from Halifax Legal Dept. today, to confirm their request for me to vacate the planned Pre-Action Disclosure hearing. In consideration of this, they are going to pay my estimated costs of approx. £250. Not bad, seeing as how they complied anyway! But I knew that they would rather that, than have to get agents out to court and risk having to explain their true charging structure to a judge

 

They have even dragged their heels on getting this part sorted, hence my insistence on having it in writing (even though it is 'without prejudice') before cancelling the hearing.

 

The encouraging thing about this is that it shows, despite the test case that they are treating as some kind of reprieve, that they are still basically frightened to death of being dragged into a court of law to justify themselves.

 

Anyway, profuse thanks and hugs to deedee and Melanie Bree for your guidance while I prepared my case; and credit to the Information Commissioners Office, whom I believe were also instrumental in getting HFX to comply with their legal obligations under the Data Protection Act 1998. Also thank you to my fellow CAG-gers for your encouragement and support. A good result in my view, although part of me would have much preferred battling it out with them in court!

 

Right... now to prepare the 'proper' Court case to get my charges back

[PI Guy]

great news well done

[Jeff2000]

Hi,

 

 

Excellent news!

 

Fight the good fight!

 

 

Jeff.

[sharpgun]

hi everyone,

have just recieved court date for pre hearing to discuss statute time barred with nat west on 26th nov.got past the stay now have to argue in court. anyone got any advice?

[gaz2006]

Im helping friend on monday re claim re business claim back to 1996 . Nat West trying to throw out under limitation act . ive read up on this section 32 etc and can see I can say when we knew ait wasnt legal etc but how can I enforce the fact they tried to conceal it ? I also want Nat west Terms and Conditions back to 1996 any ideas where to look ? i have also seen the law cases put by Zoot on the site re limitations anything else I need to be thinking about regards Gaz

[paulwlton]

Im helping friend on monday re claim re business claim back to 1996 . Nat West trying to throw out under limitation act . ive read up on this section 32 etc and can see I can say when we knew ait wasnt legal etc but how can I enforce the fact they tried to conceal it ? I also want Nat west Terms and Conditions back to 1996 any ideas where to look ? i have also seen the law cases put by Zoot on the site re limitations anything else I need to be thinking about regards Gaz

 

Is the same account still opened? Check out the thread, you may find some of it usefull.

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/general-debt/11427-walton-rbos-32.html#post1348288

[gaz2006]

n it was closed around 1992

[gaz2006]

n it was closed around 1992

oops sorry meant 2002

[elsinore]

Im helping friend on monday re claim re business claim back to 1996 . Nat West trying to throw out under limitation act . ive read up on this section 32 etc and can see I can say when we knew ait wasnt legal etc but how can I enforce the fact they tried to conceal it ? I also want Nat west Terms and Conditions back to 1996 any ideas where to look ? i have also seen the law cases put by Zoot on the site re limitations anything else I need to be thinking about regards Gaz

 

Not back to 1996 Gaz, but here are 2001 T&Cs, which is when the account was still open

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/bank-templates-library/101412-document-library-work-progress.html#post956688

 

Els

[gaz2006]

Not back to 1996 Gaz, but here are 2001 T&Cs, which is when the account was still open

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/bank-templates-library/101412-document-library-work-progress.html#post956688

 

Els

 

thansk but link says no file ha ha

[elsinore]

Hmmm, apologies Gaz, I'll check it out.

 

Els

[veester]

Can i ask a question - does the Limitation Act everyone is discussing here apply to any and civil actions?

 

Thanks

[steven4064]

Can i ask a question - does the Limitation Act everyone is discussing here apply to any and civil actions?

 

Thanks

Yes, but the timescale varies depending on the action. For ordinary contract claims the limitation period is 6 years, for personal injury it is 3 years and for property issues it is 12 years. In Scotland the periods are different (and possibly Northern Ireland too)

[Ronaldo2k]

Hi Guys,

 

I was about to put my Halifax charges through next week.

However, the "6 year" thing came to light.

 

I requested all statements from halifax and they started in 2000 and ended in 2003.

 

Now to clarify, do I need to supply certain N1 and POC form to the court?

Or do I need to amend the general N1 and POC?

 

many thanks,

 

Ron

[steven4064]

Hi Ron

 

So, are you saying that Halifax haven't sent all your statements?

 

If so, and the 40 days are up, the next step is to send the data protection non-compliance letter from the bank templates library