When the Office of Fair Trading geared up to present a report on banks and their approach to customers who exceed their overdraft limits, no one expected a daring, robust piece of literature, damning the banks and threatening to take the strongest possible action.

Just as well, because that wasn’t what they got. Instead, the OFT fluffed on about nothing in particular, apart for some stuff about the banks giving customers the option not to be able to exceed their overdraft limit at all, and therefore incur no charges.

Sounds interesting, until you realise that the banks were mournfully warning that anyone who DID exceed the limit that couldn’t be exceeded could find that it impacts on their credit rating. Oh, so that’s not really an improvement at all.

HSBC have already announced a new account that operates along these lines – the HSBC Bank Account Pay Monthly “features a strict overdraft limit that cannot be exceeded unless the bank has formally agreed a higher limit beforehand.” Yours for a monthly fee of only £15.

The OFT parped on about the fact that the banks had been doing their bit in bringing down the level of charges from obscene to just deeply unpleasant, with charges for a bounced cheque or other payment dropping from £34 to an average of £17.

Marc Gander of the Consumer Action Group said the OFT had “nothing to cheer about or to congratulate itself about,” adding, “Despite its powers and its influence, the OFT has achieved very little.”

“It has been defeated on the test case charges issue because it allowed itself to be corralled into dealing with a very narrow point of law and despite a very clear signal from the Supreme Court that there were another more realistic routes to make a challenge on behalf of bank customers, it has declined to do so.”

But if you still think that the OFT are just a toothless, meandering bunch of old duffers, wait until you read this. They’ll be keeping a careful eye on the banks over the next two years and if customers are still getting a raw deal by THEN, they’ll definitely consider doing something about it.

Keep on believing!

A hard-working bank manager, yesterday

The fall-out from the meandering bank charges legal saga continues as the Office of Fair Trading are said to be due to reveal the planned future of bank charges later today.

A voluntary code agreed by the OFT and the banks is believed to be in the pipeline and MoneySavingExpert’s Martin Lewis is predicting that charges in excess of £10 will be binned, presumably because the banks have privately conceded that they are unfair.

But there’ll be no refunds for customers who have incurred higher charges in the past – the voluntary charge levels will almost certainly be higher than most campaigners would have hoped for and most of the banks will eventually find other ways to maintain their profits.

At the weekend, The Observer highlighted the plight of a 20-year-old Alliance & Leicester customer, Lewis Mathers, who was charged the grand total of £80 after mistakenly going 15p over his authorised overdraft limit. That’s an interest rate of 53,333% and an APR of almost 2,000,000%.

Banks? Wanks more like – hur hur hur.

Yeah. Everyone hates banks don’t they. Even people who enjoy working for a bank hate banks. They’re all a shower of remorseless bastards, cackling as you drop deeper into debt after you gleefully accepted one of their acts of goodwill like a loan or an overdraft.

Not many people know this, but everyone in the banking world gets coal for Christmas from Santa every year… so you can blame the lack of our Earth’s resources on those cockshafts as well.

But who is the worst?

Well, according to figures released today, the Lloyds Banking Group attracted more complaints to the Financial Ombudsman Service in the second half of 2009 than any other financial firm. In the last 6 months, the FOS received 20,190 complaints about ‘em, including 9,952 concerning Lloyds TSB which just happens to be the highest number of complaints about an individual bank.

This is almost double the number of disgruntery than those in second place – Barclays.

The two have switched positions at the top of the complaints table but both attracted considerably more complaints than in the first six months of last year.

The ombudsman found in favour of the consumer in a higher proportion of Barclays bank complaints, upholding 65% of the total claims against them with only 51% finding favour concerning Lloyds TSB. It’s still a bit shit for both though.

During the last six months of 2009 the FOS received a total of 82,136 new complaints across the board, meaning an increase of 18% on the 69,841 cases received in the first half of 2009. The main offenders were the aforementioned, as well as Royal Bank of Scotland (with a total of 7,098 complaints), Abbey (4,918 complaints) and HSBC (3,881).

An average of 53% of complaints were upheld across all the financial groups. Not exactly ‘top box service’, eh?

David Thomas, interim chief ombudsman, said it was encouraging to see that some businesses were committed to handling complaints better, but added: “The data we have released today clearly shows that some businesses still need to do more to ensure that they deal with their customers’ complaints effectively and fairly – so that consumers do not then need to escalate their dissatisfaction to the ombudsman.”

In a statement, Lloyds Banking Group said it took all complaints seriously and was committed to ensuring that they were dealt with fairly, quickly and consistently.

“With over 30 million customers, the group has the largest customer base in the UK. The vast majority are happy with the service we provide and this is reflected in the low number of complaints we receive in relation to the high number of accounts we hold.

“We encourage our customers to share their views with us and we use that feedback to help us to provide a high quality of service. We are focused on developing a long-term and strong relationship with our customers, and the complaints and feedback process is an essential part of that relationship.”

Have you had a bad time with Lloyds? Or any bank for that matter. Slag ‘em off in the comments. Or indeed, slag anything off that takes your fancy, including this article. We’re needy for attention… even the negative kind.

[Guardian]

"Oh aye!" - a man with a dormant account, yesterday

Do you have a bank account that you never use? Do you have some money in it? Had you forgotten all about it until it was mentioned just then? Well, if so, you’re being advised that, should you have an account that’s been untouched for at least 15 years, you should get your cash before the government takes control of it.

Basically, in Alistair Darling’s pre-budget report, the chancellor announced details of the new central reclaim fund which will hold unclaimed assets from dormant accounts.

It’ll be managed by the Co-operative Financial Services (CFS) under the Financial Services Authority. The premise of this is to return assets to their owners if they come forward and reinvest the remaining money in a range of charitable causes. You’ve got ’til summer.

“The reclaim fund will ensure there will be money available to enable customers to reclaim their account monies at any time,” says Neville Richardson of CFS. “It will also ensure that any money not needed to fund reclaim applications will be passed to the Big Lottery Fund for distribution to good causes.”

According to those robbing shits from the banks and building societies, there could be as much as £400m in dormant accounts. During the development of this process, finance companies and the National Savings & Investments (NS&I) lot have been trying to reunite customers with their cash.

Of course, you don’t have to wait around in the hope that your bank or building society to get in touch with you to give you an unexpected windfall.

“Any attempt by providers to match savers with their forgotten funds should be applauded,” says Kevin Mountford from price comparison service moneysupermarket.com. “But savers shouldn’t wait to be contacted, as there are a number of ways in which you can check for lost accounts yourself.”

There is mylostaccount.org.uk which aims to reunite you with your cash or indeed, simply let you know about that account you forgot all about. That seems as good a place as any to start your search. A lot of money has been reclaimed via the initiative in the two years that it has been running.

To launch a search, you need to include as much detail as you can in the online form; you should hear back within three months. Of course, you’ll need to be able to prove who you are before you can get any money.

For more information you can visit the aforementioned site, or go to bba.org.uk, bsa.org.uk, nsandi.com and direct.gov.uk/dormantaccount.

Once you get your money out, you can spend it on beer, new undercrackers, knuckledusters… anything you like. Of course, if you leave it, it could end up going to a charitable cause. Whether a third party (regardless of who it is) should be allowed to take your money and run with it without asking is another article altogether. For now at least, get cracking and see how many pennies you can lay your hands on.

[Guardian]

A cheque, yesterday

If you read that headline to a blind person, they might think that our banks are going to kill all people from the Czech Republic. Well, tell them they are and make the rest of this article up.

For those of you who can see, you’ll be aware that cheques may not figure in our lives for much longer as Britain’s banks are voting tomorrow on whether or not to keep our cheque books in action or not.

Apparently, it costs £1 to process each cheque, which should give you the hint that it’s very unlikely that the banks will want to keep them in circulation, as they’ll favour the cheaper electronic and plastic options. As someone who used to process the vouchers at RBS, I can imagine there’ll be people who will be more than happy to see the back of the bloody things.

The Payments Council is expected to set an end date of 2018 for cheque clearing in Britain, following the lead from Ireland and Scandinavian countries who are already phasing our cheques.

Of course, this won’t affect readers of this site, who presumably do most of their banking online. But what about those folks who don’t have a computer? We’re looking at you Old People. Naturally, it’s not just the trembling bath hands of geriatrics who write cheques. A lot of small businesses (labourers mainly) who still contribute a fair chunk of the 1.4bn cheques written every year.

One other factor worth considering is that, whilst cheques cost the banks money, things like BACS payments actively earn them money. Could it be that our financial institutions are going to encourage us to do stuff that costs us money at the behest of something that doesn’t? Not including bounced cheques of course.

Whatever. My main concern lies elsewhere.

What will telethons do now when someone needs to present a charity with some money? The large novelty cheque will be replaced by someone leaping onto the left button of a giant mouse to electronically transfer the funds via a giganto novelty PC?

What will people win on Blankety Blank now?

[Guardian]

Some charges, yesterday

Breaking news from the Supreme Court of all things that are good, right and justiceful is that the banks have WON their appeal in the test case relating to unauthorised overdraft charges.

Diana Ross Lord Phillips is the Supreme Court judge who has handed down the ruling that could shut the door on a flood of refunds to millions of customers of bibblions of pounds. Yes, bibblions.

The ruling means that the Office Of Fair Trading will now not be granted immediate power to scrutinise the fairness of overdraft fees. Had the banks lost, the OFT’s subsequent report would almost certainly have lead to a deluge of refunds. But in his ruling, Lord Phillips said that bank customers agreed to pay overdraft charges as part of the price of having a current account, so they fell outside the scope of the appropriate regulations.

But all is not necessarily lost for campaigners – Lord Phillips said that the OFT could still try to scrutinise bank charges under other regulations. The OFT have previously said that, in the event of a defeat, they would seek to instigate a full competition commission enquiry in a bid to lower overdraft fees.

Which? chief executive, Peter Vicary-Smith, said:

“This is a bitter blow for the millions of people who have been patiently waiting to get their bank charges back. Not only does it give banks licence to charge what they like for unauthorised overdrafts, but it could have ramifications for other areas of personal finance. The banks now have no excuse for introducing other fee charges.

“The banks have done everything possible to frustrate the OFT throughout this process. The OFT and the Government should now explore other avenues it can pursue to get a fair deal for consumers.”

The banks are still trying to get their heads around the fact that they can no longer charge customers vast, disproportionate sums of money every time they exceed their overdraft limit – and it’s troubling them deeply.

Don’t worry though, because they’re looking at alternative ways of getting back all that money that made that wasn’t rightfully theirs in the first place. It’s a little bit like a burglar being released from prison, accepting that breaking into houses was wrong and turning his attentions to mugging old ladies instead.

The newspapers are speculating on how the banks will claw back all that dirty money and the Daily Mail are suggesting that charges for cash machine withdrawals could be introduced. Helpfully. they fail to back up this claim with any quotes that might actually give their story any foundation. Good old Daily Mail – helping disrupt the sleep of millions of their readers every day.

Elsewhere, it’s cheques that could be in the firing line. The Payments Council might sound like an acid jazz combo but they’re actually a group made up from representatives of all the banks. On December 16^th they’ll be voting over whether or not to scrap cheques forever by 2018.

The big cheque could soon be obsolete...

Good for them – it costs them a pound to process a cheque and that money is obviously eating an unacceptable hole in their vast profits. Well, even though hardly anyone is using cheques any more, which must be the main reason for scrapping them. [Bitterwallet does stat check] – yep, only 3.8 million cheques are written every day. Just four per cent of all payments. That’s a poxy amount. Ban them now we say!

Finally from Scumbag Corner, you’d expect the Financial Ombudsman Service to be a holier-than-thou organisation, staffed by right-thinking folk all keen to see that fair play wins every time there’s a clash between customer and financial corporation.

Sadly, and inevitably, you’d be wrong. A former FOS adjudicator has turned whistleblower, explaining how staff are set near-impossible targets to meet when it comes to clearing cases, meaning that scores of cases are under-investigated and justice is rarely done.

Adjudicators also receive little training beyond a one-day induction course and many of them are ill-equipped to deal with the complex cases that they are expected to investigate. A spokesman for the ombudsman more or less backed up this claim by telling The Times: “Our work would be much easier if businesses dealt with us and their customers in plain English.”

Aw, bless them…

A bank manager, yesterday

It’s been a long time coming, but the drawn-out bank charges debacle could finally come to an end next Wednesday (November 25th). That’s the date that’s been set for the Supreme Court decision as to whether the OFT has the right to assess whether or not bank charges are fair.

The decision is expected to find in the OFT’s favour and lead to an investigation that should take… ooh, all of five fucking minutes to ascertain that no, they’re  not fair. Not in the eyes of the law anyway.

Assuming that the arrogance of the banks won’t stretch to taking the fight to the European courts, the decision should open the floodgates and see millions, billions and possibly even a whole gazillion pounds returned to customers from financial institutions who didn’t bother to check with the lawyers before they escalated bank charges into a major revenue stream for themselves.

It is believed that 1.1 million customers have claims that have been put on hold during the two-year court case, and there’ll be many more who’ll be looking to get back what is lawfully theirs over the coming months, should the banks call it quits after the Supreme Court’s inevitable judgement.

Some bank charges yesterday

Britain’s morally-bankrupt banks have been given even longer to desperately try to scrabble together the squillions of quids that they’ll inevitably need to pay out at some point in the future. That’s cash that will be heading back to customers who they have unfairly overcharged for going over their overdraft limits or having bounced cheques and returned direct debit payments.

They have been granted a further six month waiver against having to respond to claims from customers while the test case to establish the legality of the charges is debated in the House of Lords.

As we reported recently, the banks’ tactics have shifted away from arguing their legal position on the charges themselves to damage limitation in terms of the amount they may eventually have to pay back. The Consumer Action Group are suggesting it could be as much as £150 billion.

Meanwhile, in other idiot bank news, HSBC have been fined £3 million by the FSA for mislaying the personal details of as many as 180,000 of their insurance customers. An investigation showed that security procedures were pathetic at best and that HSBC staff would regularly send CD-ROMS crammed with customers’ private info through the post without paying for Special or Recorded Delivery.

To be honest, they might has well have handed them to the nearest tramp, explained vaguely what the address on the front of the envelope meant and told him there was a bottle of white cider in it for him if he delivered correctly within the next six months.

The raging cocks.

A shark, yesterday

Have you ever tried shopping around for the cheapest loan – applying through different lenders and then going with the one that offered you the best deal? You’ve probably made a mistake – every application you make goes on your credit file, and the more applications you make, the shabbier your credit rating becomes.

What we need is a way for us to shop around with the major banks, a method we can use where we can find out what % APR we would qualify for without besmirching our credit file with a full-on application. Guess what – it exists. Guess what again – none of the major UK high street banks offer it.

It’s called a quotation search, it was introduced five years ago by credit reference agencies and is recommended by the Information Commissioners Office as an example of best practice. But the banks won’t carry out the searches because they say each one costs £1.40 (at last, some honesty about the true cost of a simple process!) but it’s more likely that they’re all collectively happy not to let you shop around, making it easier for them to hoover up your business as you worry about tarnishing your credit rating.

There you go – as the headline said, another reason to hate your bank. And it’s still early on a Monday morning.

[Observer]

In a refreshing development, we’ll soon be able to find out how disgruntled a bank’s existing customers are before we choose whether or not to dump our bundle with them.

From September next year, banks and insurers will be among those forced to publicly reveal the number of complaints they receive from their customers, as the growing culture of transparency hits the financial sector.

The data will be collected from January 2010 and the first FSA publication of complaint numbers will follow eight months later, with updates coming every subsequent six months.

The stats will cover the sectors of banking, home finance, general insurance and pure protection, life and pensions, and investments.

The news follows an announcement of a huge increase in complaints to the Financial Ombudsman service from customers who feel their complaints are being stonewalled by their banks.

Banks eh? Shit-kickers more like.

[Times]

A bank manager, yesterday.

The latest chapter in the ongoing saga that is the bank charges court case will be written from Tuesday onwards, as seven banks and a building society take what looks like a pointless and ridiculous appeal to the House Of Lords. They’re up against the Office Of Fair Trading, who say the amount of money banks charge customers for going overdrawn or bouncing cheques, up to £38 per charge, is unlawful.

The banks were in ruder health when the whole thing started back in 2003, and with the government currently in control of the RBS and Lloyds, we’re basically seeing two separate arms of government farcically trading blows with each other while the taxpayer looks on, wincing.

The flood of claims by bank customers was stopped in 2007 when the whole sorry farce took itself off to the courts, where the banks have repeatedly lost and then appealed to the next highest court. Don’t think for a minute that the House Of Lords will be their final port of call – there’s still Europe and the intergalactic court of King Zod from the Planet Zarjazz to come yet.

Meanhwhile, Which? are calling for all those involved to help out customers who are suffering financial hardship as a result of these brutal charges. If you can show that you’re struggling with basic living costs, your case against your bank can be fast-tracked.

Hey! Do you know how long it takes a cheque to clear once you’ve paid it into your bank? Do you really? If you were told by a staff member at your bank or building society it means you probably don’t know, because a survey has shown that two thirds of them don’t have a Scooby either.

The mystery shopper survey was carried out by the Banking Code Standards Board in the first three months of this year, and the results were shockingly bad. The board noted that although staff appeared confident, they were consistently giving out misinformation, possibly as a result of poor quality training. No doubt the majority of training time is devoted to selling techniques and target achieving rather than facts that could genuinely help customers.

For the record, interest must be credited no more than two days after a cheque has been paid in and the money must be available to be drawn out after no more than four days. A cheque is deemed to have cleared absolutely after six days and it cannot bounce after that six day period has elapsed.

Next time you’re in a bank and have a genuine question about your bank you might as well ask the nearest cash machine – you’ve got a 50/50 chance of getting as much help from it as you will from the wonk behind the glass.

Fed up with your bank? Here’s a few ways you can piss THEM off for a change.

Some bank managers, yesterday.

Them banks – they’re a right old set of snivelling, responsibility-dodging tosspots aren’t they? You might not agree, unless you’ve tried airing a grievance against one of them recently.

The Financial Ombudsman Service has reported receiving 40% more complaints against banks than they expected over the past year. More significantly, around 60% of complaints have been judged in favour of the consumer, as opposed to the normal level of between 30-40%.

Those figures suggest that banks are stonewalling the vast majority of their customers’ grievances, with the truth only being revealed once the customer escalates the complaint to the ombudsman. Perhaps we’re living in a new climate where we’re not prepared to be fobbed off and are more comfortable with standing up for ourselves. Following the ongoing bank charges rumpus and the credit crunch, we’re definitely living in a climate of stronger anti-bank feeling.

If you’ve got a grievance against a financial institution, start off by complaining directly to them – by law they have eight weeks to respond. If they fail to do so or reject your complaint, you have a further six months to take your case to the FOS. Call 0845 080 1800 or visit financial-ombudsman.org.uk .

Have you found yourself caught up in the long, drawn-out complaint process? Did you win comfortably and now walk a few inches taller or did the whole thing send you a bit Susan Boyle? Go on, tell us.

[The Times]

Liquid gold in its sold state. Makes no difference, you still won't get this.

How would you feel if you’d bunged your money in a savings account called ‘The All-Singing, All-Dancing, Many Bells And Many Whistles, Ram-A-Lang-A-Ding-Dong Rocket Account’ only to find that it gave you a crappy interest rate of 0.1%?

The Advertising Standards Authority are planning an investigation into banks and building societies with accounts that have sexy, thrusting names but actually deliver next to nothing for savers.

For example, the name of the Halifax’s Liquid Gold account would suggest that a lucky saver would be on the receiving end of a never-ending stream of interest cash flowing into the account – in truth you’ll get a rate of 0.1%. It’s the same story with HSBC’s Premier Savings, First Direct’s Bonus Savings and the Newcastle Building Society’s Nova Plus instant access account. Exciting names – poxy returns.

The findings come following analysis by independent experts Defaqto, who say that banks were offering a sexy, thrusting 6.5% on instant access savings accounts as recently as last November. For better returns, savers should look at moving their cash around regularly, following the best deals or switching to fixed-rate bonds, which can pay over 4%.

In a nutshell, if you see an account that calls itself the ‘Free Sex And Molten Cash Account,’ read the small print before you plough your hard-earned into it.

[Guardian]