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I am furious.
I have an account with a well-known building society (we'll call them Nationwide) and I am having an absolute nightmare with them at the moment.
I only use this account to transfer savings into - the balance is never more than a couple of quid, and I rarely check its statements because I use it so infrequently.
In May, I had to transfer some money from my savings into this account, as I had halls of residence fees to pay. I checked my account balance online to make sure that the money had gone through, and found that there was £60 less in there than there should have been. I looked around all of the different sections of the account to see what was going on... and found that a Direct Debit had been set up without my authorisation, and had been trying to withdraw £50 a month from my account, to pay for somebody's gym subscription!
The problem is that because I had so little money in the account, the Direct Debits could not be processed. So each time this happened, I was charged a £30 unpaid debit fee. Needless to say, none of this was my fault; I don't use a gym and I certainly wouldn't pay £50 a month to go to one.
Anyway, as soon as I noticed all of this I got on the phone to Nationwide and spoke to a girl, explained what had happened and she cancelled the Direct Debit. She also assured me that all of the money would be refunded to me. When I asked her why the payment had been set up in the first place, she said that it must have been a mistake by one of their members of staff when they were typing in the details (i.e. they had typed my details in by mistake).
About a week later, I received a letter from a customer service administrator, saying that the money had been refunded and the penalties cancelled. It was written in a very patronising way, giving me 'useful tips on how to avoid incurring charges in the future'. This made me so angry; it was their fault that I had gone overdrawn in the first place! I went and checked my statement, only to find that none of the charges had been refunded, and I had been charged another unpaid debit fee.
At this point I was absolutely fuming, so I got on the phone and called the guy who sent me the letter. He apologised that it hadn't been taken care of, and assured me that he would get it sorted out for me straight away. I told him to send me written confirmation that it had all been sorted, and he agreed. I took his word for it and assumed that it would all be taken care of.
So I checked my statement today, and to my dismay, the money still had not been refunded, and yet another £30 fine had been imposed on me. I was incandescent with rage. I got on the phone, spoke to the guy I spoke to previously, and made it clear how furious I was with the whole situation. I demanded to know why, despite being promised twice that it had been taken care of, I was still in the red. His excuse was (and bear in mind this is a huge company) 'I asked Jez to do it and for some reason he hasn't put it through'. I was so angry. I demanded that he refunded the money there and then, and send me a letter without fail to confirm it all. He agreed, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if I never receive a letter and am still overdrawn this time next week. I told him that not only will I be canceling the account, I will be making a personal complaint against him and possibly going to the press.
I rarely complain about service I receive, but this is truly appalling. My credit rating has probably taken a real battering, considering that I do not have an authorised overdraft on the account, and I've been overdrawn and incurring charges for over a month.
Have any of you been in a similar situation? If so, what did you do? How can you get this sorted out, and above all, who can you complain to? If you ask somebody to explain what's happened, they blame someone else. If you speak to the other person, they refer you to someone else, and so on... it never ends. Who are you supposed to get angry with, when nobody will accept responsibility? It is utterly infuriating.
Sorry for the rant, but I have never been so furious with a company (or anyone, for that matter) in my life. Thanks for reading
I only use this account to transfer savings into - the balance is never more than a couple of quid, and I rarely check its statements because I use it so infrequently.
In May, I had to transfer some money from my savings into this account, as I had halls of residence fees to pay. I checked my account balance online to make sure that the money had gone through, and found that there was £60 less in there than there should have been. I looked around all of the different sections of the account to see what was going on... and found that a Direct Debit had been set up without my authorisation, and had been trying to withdraw £50 a month from my account, to pay for somebody's gym subscription!
The problem is that because I had so little money in the account, the Direct Debits could not be processed. So each time this happened, I was charged a £30 unpaid debit fee. Needless to say, none of this was my fault; I don't use a gym and I certainly wouldn't pay £50 a month to go to one.
Anyway, as soon as I noticed all of this I got on the phone to Nationwide and spoke to a girl, explained what had happened and she cancelled the Direct Debit. She also assured me that all of the money would be refunded to me. When I asked her why the payment had been set up in the first place, she said that it must have been a mistake by one of their members of staff when they were typing in the details (i.e. they had typed my details in by mistake).
About a week later, I received a letter from a customer service administrator, saying that the money had been refunded and the penalties cancelled. It was written in a very patronising way, giving me 'useful tips on how to avoid incurring charges in the future'. This made me so angry; it was their fault that I had gone overdrawn in the first place! I went and checked my statement, only to find that none of the charges had been refunded, and I had been charged another unpaid debit fee.
At this point I was absolutely fuming, so I got on the phone and called the guy who sent me the letter. He apologised that it hadn't been taken care of, and assured me that he would get it sorted out for me straight away. I told him to send me written confirmation that it had all been sorted, and he agreed. I took his word for it and assumed that it would all be taken care of.
So I checked my statement today, and to my dismay, the money still had not been refunded, and yet another £30 fine had been imposed on me. I was incandescent with rage. I got on the phone, spoke to the guy I spoke to previously, and made it clear how furious I was with the whole situation. I demanded to know why, despite being promised twice that it had been taken care of, I was still in the red. His excuse was (and bear in mind this is a huge company) 'I asked Jez to do it and for some reason he hasn't put it through'. I was so angry. I demanded that he refunded the money there and then, and send me a letter without fail to confirm it all. He agreed, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if I never receive a letter and am still overdrawn this time next week. I told him that not only will I be canceling the account, I will be making a personal complaint against him and possibly going to the press.
I rarely complain about service I receive, but this is truly appalling. My credit rating has probably taken a real battering, considering that I do not have an authorised overdraft on the account, and I've been overdrawn and incurring charges for over a month.
Have any of you been in a similar situation? If so, what did you do? How can you get this sorted out, and above all, who can you complain to? If you ask somebody to explain what's happened, they blame someone else. If you speak to the other person, they refer you to someone else, and so on... it never ends. Who are you supposed to get angry with, when nobody will accept responsibility? It is utterly infuriating.
Sorry for the rant, but I have never been so furious with a company (or anyone, for that matter) in my life. Thanks for reading
Scroll to see replies
I've never been in a situation like yours ... but I do feel for you.
Most companies nowadays are rubbish at customer service. O2 for example told me I could only have the phone I wanted for £99, no special deals or anything - I had been with them for a year so expected something. Rang up a different number, the cancellation team, said I was going to go somewhere else and got the phone at £9.99 and lots of money off my contract. I know it is like this at most places but couldn't they have just saved my time by telling me that in the first place.
Also, we had loads of problems with our internet .. tried ringing up and they kept telling us to switch modem off, reset it etc etc although we kept saying this was not the problem! Then, we rang up one night and someone had the intelligence to look at our account and tell us it had not been activated. Hurrah.
3 weeks without the Internet because people were just ignorant.
Good luck with your situation
Sarah
Most companies nowadays are rubbish at customer service. O2 for example told me I could only have the phone I wanted for £99, no special deals or anything - I had been with them for a year so expected something. Rang up a different number, the cancellation team, said I was going to go somewhere else and got the phone at £9.99 and lots of money off my contract. I know it is like this at most places but couldn't they have just saved my time by telling me that in the first place.
Also, we had loads of problems with our internet .. tried ringing up and they kept telling us to switch modem off, reset it etc etc although we kept saying this was not the problem! Then, we rang up one night and someone had the intelligence to look at our account and tell us it had not been activated. Hurrah.
3 weeks without the Internet because people were just ignorant.
Good luck with your situation
Sarah
Sazarina88
Rang up a different number, the cancellation team, said I was going to go somewhere else and got the phone at £9.99 and lots of money off my contract.
What did you say exactly!? What phone did you manage to get and how much did your contract change by?
Sorry, but if I can get a significant discount by doing this, I will!
Orange are pretty desperado to keep their customers....if you phone and threaten to cut off, they'll start lowering their prices stat.
The future's bright.
The future's bright.
Disproportionate charges by banks have been deemed illegal by the office of fair trading. There was a very interesting article on this about a month back in the Telegraph.
The problem is that if you slip into unauthorised overdraft you won’t just be charged for going into the red. You could also be charged a similar amount each time a transaction, direct debit or standing order goes through your account while you are in the red.
Take a look at the Consumer Action Group http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/
I challanged these charges my bank levied against my account and so far (it's a long process) they are refunding all my money. In the website above there are example letter to send to your bank as you have to be very specific in what you right in order to claim your money back.
The problem is that if you slip into unauthorised overdraft you won’t just be charged for going into the red. You could also be charged a similar amount each time a transaction, direct debit or standing order goes through your account while you are in the red.
Take a look at the Consumer Action Group http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/
I challanged these charges my bank levied against my account and so far (it's a long process) they are refunding all my money. In the website above there are example letter to send to your bank as you have to be very specific in what you right in order to claim your money back.
BlackHawk
Disproportionate charges by banks have been deemed illegal by the office of fair trading. There was a very interesting article on this about a month back in the Telegraph.
The problem is that if you slip into unauthorised overdraft you won’t just be charged for going into the red. You could also be charged a similar amount each time a transaction, direct debit or standing order goes through your account while you are in the red.
Take a look at the Consumer Action Group http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/
I challanged these charges my bank levied against my account and so far (it's a long process) they are refunding all my money. In the website above there are example letter to send to your bank as you have to be very specific in what you right in order to claim your money back.
The problem is that if you slip into unauthorised overdraft you won’t just be charged for going into the red. You could also be charged a similar amount each time a transaction, direct debit or standing order goes through your account while you are in the red.
Take a look at the Consumer Action Group http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/
I challanged these charges my bank levied against my account and so far (it's a long process) they are refunding all my money. In the website above there are example letter to send to your bank as you have to be very specific in what you right in order to claim your money back.
That's all very well... but that has nothing to do with my situation.
I didn't accidentally slip into the red, my bank made a mistake and are penalising me for it.
Juno
Go to the police. It's fraud if someone has set up a direct debit on your account. Then they'll have to take you seriously.
My initial thought when I first noticed was that somebody had stolen my account details. But then I realised that they'd be a bit stupid just to take £50 a month. And the people representing Nationwide said it was almost certainly an error by one of their employees.
One mistake I can live with, but promising me twice that they had canceled the charges when in fact they had done bugger all... I find that rather hard to accept.
The thing that annoys me most is the way that they are making it out that I have been irresponsible with my account and that they are doing me a favour by refunding the money. Really, the letter they sent me is the most patronising thing I've ever read. I would type it up now but it's buried in my room somewhere.
I'm going into the branch tomorrow to bash some ears. Any words of advice?
the thing is you have to write them a letter, no phone calls, and tell them everything that happened. tell them if the matter is not resolved the police will be involved.
CC the letter the the Financial Services Authority, the regulator for the industry.. i did this with hsbc for giving me random charges last year.... i got my money back and an extra £25 and an apology because they didnt want the FSA to be involved with the matter.
As soon as you mention the FSA they will start listening to you
CC the letter the the Financial Services Authority, the regulator for the industry.. i did this with hsbc for giving me random charges last year.... i got my money back and an extra £25 and an apology because they didnt want the FSA to be involved with the matter.
As soon as you mention the FSA they will start listening to you
mousey
Go to the press? seriously?
Why not? The guy on the phone only started to take action when I told him I would go to the press if it wasn't sorted out straight away.
I worked for a year and a half in customer services (it was a medical emergency helpline, often dealing with bereaved families) so I have been trained to the very highest level of customer care. The way I've been treated by Nationwide has been appalling to say the least. Constantly being kept on hold, having promises made to me which haven't been honoured, people refusing to accept responsibility. Three of the worst things you can do to a customer.
I also know from working for a big company, when mistakes are made people will always try and pass the blame to somebody else. The only way to be taken seriously as a customer is to effectively scare them into taking action. I almost certainly won't go to the press, but at least now they know that I won't take any more crap from them.
addagrrr8
the thing is you have to write them a letter, no phone calls, and tell them everything that happened. tell them if the matter is not resolved the police will be involved.
CC the letter the the Financial Services Authority, the regulator for the industry.. i did this with hsbc for giving me random charges last year.... i got my money back and an extra £25 and an apology because they didnt want the FSA to be involved with the matter.
As soon as you mention the FSA they will start listening to you
CC the letter the the Financial Services Authority, the regulator for the industry.. i did this with hsbc for giving me random charges last year.... i got my money back and an extra £25 and an apology because they didnt want the FSA to be involved with the matter.
As soon as you mention the FSA they will start listening to you
Cool, good idea
I did in fact start the whole complaint off by writing an email to their head of customer service... but all I got back was a copied and pasted email, telling me how direct debits work and why I was being charged.
Once all of this is resolved, I will be making a serious complaint, so thanks for the advice.
#2(Laika)
id be angry too mate....those damn companies are just lazy weirdos who dont do there jobs properly!
Too right. They don't seem to realise how frustrating it is, as a customer. It's all kind of, 'yeah we'll get that done within 2-3 working days'. Yeah, sure you will. Make that a month and a half, cretins.
Nice name by the way... an Arcade Fire fan?
Follow the instructions on this site: http://www.ivafreehelp.co.uk/bank_accounts_reclaim_bank_charges.htm
It gives you a very concise method for resolving this issue.
It gives you a very concise method for resolving this issue.
Write a very strongly worded letter, outlining everything you've said in this thread, and giving them a week to reply. Tell them that if you have not heard from them by such-and-such a date, you will contact the FSA and make a formal complaint.
In your letter, you should outline exactly what you want from them. I suggest something like this:
1) I will require the direct debit to be cancelled, the incorrect charges to be removed, and written confirmation that this has been done.
2) I will require written confirmation that my credit rating will not suffer as a result of this mistake.
3) I have made X number of telephone calls and spent approximately X number of hours/minutes attempting to resolve this. According to my telephone provider I have spent approximately £X on calls. I will require this amount to be credited to my account.
4) I am a very busy person and have had to give up hours of my time resolving this issue. I will require £X amount of compensation to make up for the amount of time I have spent sorting this out. (I suggest asking for about £50.)
Then finish by reminding them how badly they have treated you and reminding them that if they do not comply with your requests you will make a formal complaint.
In your letter, you should outline exactly what you want from them. I suggest something like this:
1) I will require the direct debit to be cancelled, the incorrect charges to be removed, and written confirmation that this has been done.
2) I will require written confirmation that my credit rating will not suffer as a result of this mistake.
3) I have made X number of telephone calls and spent approximately X number of hours/minutes attempting to resolve this. According to my telephone provider I have spent approximately £X on calls. I will require this amount to be credited to my account.
4) I am a very busy person and have had to give up hours of my time resolving this issue. I will require £X amount of compensation to make up for the amount of time I have spent sorting this out. (I suggest asking for about £50.)
Then finish by reminding them how badly they have treated you and reminding them that if they do not comply with your requests you will make a formal complaint.
jeff's_dead
I have an account with a well-known building society (we'll call them Nationwide) and I am having an absolute nightmare with them at the moment.
I only use this account to transfer savings into - the balance is never more than a couple of quid, and I rarely check its statements because I use it so infrequently.
In May, I had to transfer some money from my savings into this account, as I had halls of residence fees to pay. I checked my account balance online to make sure that the money had gone through, and found that there was £60 less in there than there should have been. I looked around all of the different sections of the account to see what was going on... and found that a Direct Debit had been set up without my authorisation, and had been trying to withdraw £50 a month from my account, to pay for somebody's gym subscription!
The problem is that because I had so little money in the account, the Direct Debits could not be processed. So each time this happened, I was charged a £30 unpaid debit fee. Needless to say, none of this was my fault; I don't use a gym and I certainly wouldn't pay £50 a month to go to one.
Anyway, as soon as I noticed all of this I got on the phone to Nationwide and spoke to a girl, explained what had happened and she cancelled the Direct Debit. She also assured me that all of the money would be refunded to me. When I asked her why the payment had been set up in the first place, she said that it must have been a mistake by one of their members of staff when they were typing in the details (i.e. they had typed my details in by mistake).
About a week later, I received a letter from a customer service administrator, saying that the money had been refunded and the penalties cancelled. It was written in a very patronising way, giving me 'useful tips on how to avoid incurring charges in the future'. This made me so angry; it was their fault that I had gone overdrawn in the first place! I went and checked my statement, only to find that none of the charges had been refunded, and I had been charged another unpaid debit fee.
At this point I was absolutely fuming, so I got on the phone and called the guy who sent me the letter. He apologised that it hadn't been taken care of, and assured me that he would get it sorted out for me straight away. I told him to send me written confirmation that it had all been sorted, and he agreed. I took his word for it and assumed that it would all be taken care of.
So I checked my statement today, and to my dismay, the money still had not been refunded, and yet another £30 fine had been imposed on me. I was incandescent with rage. I got on the phone, spoke to the guy I spoke to previously, and made it clear how furious I was with the whole situation. I demanded to know why, despite being promised twice that it had been taken care of, I was still in the red. His excuse was (and bear in mind this is a huge company) 'I asked Jez to do it and for some reason he hasn't put it through'. I was so angry. I demanded that he refunded the money there and then, and send me a letter without fail to confirm it all. He agreed, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if I never receive a letter and am still overdrawn this time next week. I told him that not only will I be canceling the account, I will be making a personal complaint against him and possibly going to the press.
I rarely complain about service I receive, but this is truly appalling. My credit rating has probably taken a real battering, considering that I do not have an authorised overdraft on the account, and I've been overdrawn and incurring charges for over a month.
Have any of you been in a similar situation? If so, what did you do? How can you get this sorted out, and above all, who can you complain to? If you ask somebody to explain what's happened, they blame someone else. If you speak to the other person, they refer you to someone else, and so on... it never ends. Who are you supposed to get angry with, when nobody will accept responsibility? It is utterly infuriating.
Sorry for the rant, but I have never been so furious with a company (or anyone, for that matter) in my life. Thanks for reading
I only use this account to transfer savings into - the balance is never more than a couple of quid, and I rarely check its statements because I use it so infrequently.
In May, I had to transfer some money from my savings into this account, as I had halls of residence fees to pay. I checked my account balance online to make sure that the money had gone through, and found that there was £60 less in there than there should have been. I looked around all of the different sections of the account to see what was going on... and found that a Direct Debit had been set up without my authorisation, and had been trying to withdraw £50 a month from my account, to pay for somebody's gym subscription!
The problem is that because I had so little money in the account, the Direct Debits could not be processed. So each time this happened, I was charged a £30 unpaid debit fee. Needless to say, none of this was my fault; I don't use a gym and I certainly wouldn't pay £50 a month to go to one.
Anyway, as soon as I noticed all of this I got on the phone to Nationwide and spoke to a girl, explained what had happened and she cancelled the Direct Debit. She also assured me that all of the money would be refunded to me. When I asked her why the payment had been set up in the first place, she said that it must have been a mistake by one of their members of staff when they were typing in the details (i.e. they had typed my details in by mistake).
About a week later, I received a letter from a customer service administrator, saying that the money had been refunded and the penalties cancelled. It was written in a very patronising way, giving me 'useful tips on how to avoid incurring charges in the future'. This made me so angry; it was their fault that I had gone overdrawn in the first place! I went and checked my statement, only to find that none of the charges had been refunded, and I had been charged another unpaid debit fee.
At this point I was absolutely fuming, so I got on the phone and called the guy who sent me the letter. He apologised that it hadn't been taken care of, and assured me that he would get it sorted out for me straight away. I told him to send me written confirmation that it had all been sorted, and he agreed. I took his word for it and assumed that it would all be taken care of.
So I checked my statement today, and to my dismay, the money still had not been refunded, and yet another £30 fine had been imposed on me. I was incandescent with rage. I got on the phone, spoke to the guy I spoke to previously, and made it clear how furious I was with the whole situation. I demanded to know why, despite being promised twice that it had been taken care of, I was still in the red. His excuse was (and bear in mind this is a huge company) 'I asked Jez to do it and for some reason he hasn't put it through'. I was so angry. I demanded that he refunded the money there and then, and send me a letter without fail to confirm it all. He agreed, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if I never receive a letter and am still overdrawn this time next week. I told him that not only will I be canceling the account, I will be making a personal complaint against him and possibly going to the press.
I rarely complain about service I receive, but this is truly appalling. My credit rating has probably taken a real battering, considering that I do not have an authorised overdraft on the account, and I've been overdrawn and incurring charges for over a month.
Have any of you been in a similar situation? If so, what did you do? How can you get this sorted out, and above all, who can you complain to? If you ask somebody to explain what's happened, they blame someone else. If you speak to the other person, they refer you to someone else, and so on... it never ends. Who are you supposed to get angry with, when nobody will accept responsibility? It is utterly infuriating.
Sorry for the rant, but I have never been so furious with a company (or anyone, for that matter) in my life. Thanks for reading
What?!
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