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Claim back cash from banks and Credit Card Companies |
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Claim back credit card charges
Credit card
companies have long been masters of hidden charges that can easily add up, but
can be very difficult to avoid.
Payment Allocation
One of the
cheekiest ways credit card companies get extra charges out of their customers is
via the system they use to decide which bits of your credit card balance to pay
off first, called 'Allocation of Payments'.
Basically,
it usually means that the stuff they make most money on is paid off last, and
the stuff they make little to no money on is paid off first. This means that if
you have a £500 interest free balance from a balance transfer, but you spend
£100 at the normal purchase rate, you'll carry on paying interest on the £100
unless all of the £500 is paid off first. If you only make the minimum payment, this may take years, meaning you're paying interest on the £100 for all that time. It also happens in the case of payday loans, but credit cards involve more hidden charged than payday loans.
Claim charges back
You may not
be able to get allocation payments back but if you’ve been charged large amounts
for going over your limit you may well be able to claim that back.
Back in April
2006 the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) said that credit card companies were wrong
to charge as much as £35 for sending letters and other administrative charges
that cost the companies only a few pounds at most.
Although the
charges weren’t made illegal most card companies reduced their charges to, a
still very high,
£12 level.
What the OFT
report does mean is that customers can claim credit card charges that are
unfair.
At the very
least, for each £35 charge, you should get at least £23 of it back, occasionally
you may be able to get the whole £35.
When you sign
a credit card agreement you are entering into a contract with the company. Going
over the limit of the agreement is a breach of contract and the company can
legally enforce payment.
The credit
card company can cover costs caused by the breach of contract, the amount itself
plus administration charges. However if it trys to charge you more than this
amount it is considered ‘penalty charge’ and this cannot be legally enforced.
You can try
to claim back any excessive charges, which the law would class as penalties,
such as £20 charges for letters.
To claim back
unfair charges you will need to review old statements and add up all charges
that could be considered excessive. If you don’t the statements and cannot find
them online ask your bank directly for a list of all charges showing what the
offence was, the date and the amount. The credit card company should provide
this information in 40 working days.
Once you’ve
all the information you need write to the credit card company, giving details of
all unfair charges and request that they pay back these charges.
For more
information on claiming back credit card charges take a look at
http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/ and
http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/reclaim/credit-card-charges?dd
PPI refund
Payment
Protection Insurance or PPI insures people's loan re-payments if they fall ill
or lose their jobs.
Many people
were mis-informed or victims of over aggressive sales techniques when they
agreed to take out PPI
Two and three
quarter million people could be refunded as much as £2.7bn for being mis-sold
Payment Protection Insurance (PPI).
The Financial
Services Authority (FSA) has given banks and other lenders until 1 December to
adopt new rules for dealing with PPI complaints.
The FSA said
that over five years it had found "wide and deep evidence of weaknesses in PPI
sales".
The FSA
expects its new rules to force the financial services industry to deal with
about 550,000 complaints a year for the next five years.
Average
compensation will vary from £900 for those who were mis-sold about
regular-premium PPI policies to £1,800 for those mis-sold single-premium
policies.
Citizens Advice debt policy officer Peter Tutton said:
“We welcome
the fact that the FSA is taking firm and appropriate action to get to grips with
the harm done to consumers by widespread mis-selling of payment protection
insurance (PPI) over many years – the subject of a Citizens Advice super
complaint to the Office of Fair Trading back in 2005*.
“Evidence
from our CAB network has consistently shown that too often consumers have been
mis-sold PPI policies that are far too expensive and completely unsuitable for
their needs, often contributing to debt problems.
“We agree
with the FSA that the PPI market has been broken for too long and needs fixing.
A huge step to restoring consumer confidence is ensuring that people who
complain get a fair hearing and proper redress. Up until now, firms have too
often handled complaints very badly, so FSA action to spell out to firms what is
expected of them was absolutely necessary.
“When firms
aren't properly listening to their customers’ problems the regulator needs to
take quick and decisive action to ensure that people are treated fairly and not
ripped-off, so it’s encouraging to see the FSA step up to the plate to curb bad
practice and ensure that consumers get the right outcomes.”
If you think
you have been mis-sold PPI find out more about how to claim your money back:
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