Welcome to Legal Beagles Consumer Forums Legal Beagles is a FREE forum offering support, discussion & advice in many areas of your life. Made up of dedicated & enthusiastic individuals who are experienced in consumer issues. Most of us are fighting, or have successfully fought, our own battles against the major financial institutions. We are committed to remaining free to access with no advertising. VISIT THE FORUM
LegalBeagles response to BIS consultation on Unfair Charges 11 May 10.30am
Our response sets out to answer the questions raised within the Call for Evidence, we believe that the issues involved go wider than the specific ambit of the consultation document. In particular, we have concerns at the way the Supreme Court Judgment in the Test Case has been summarised and explained within the consultation paper, and we address those concerns within the main body of this response. As will be seen, we are of the view that there is still scope for the applicability of Regulation 5(1) of the UTCCRs in respect of current and historic bank charges, as highlighted by the Supreme Court decision. In the Annexe to this response we set out our views as to how Regulation 5(1) of the UTCCRs could be used in their current form to control the level and extent of contingent or ancillary charges. It is our view that the issue of current and historic bank charges is far from resolved, regardless of any legislative changes brought about by the Consumer Rights Directive.
Legal Beagles welcome their 10,000th Member ... 17 August 2010 2.40pm - Amethyst This site was launched in May 2007 and thanks to the dedication of the site's team and members has enjoyed steady growth and now attracts around 2000 visitors per day.
We are privileged to have such dedicated fairness advocates on board. One of the largest campaigns of the site has been for fairness in bank charges. We had members attend every day of the OFT v Abbey National Plc "test case" hearings, appeals and judgment hand downs, enabling us to report up to the minute information in plain intelligible language. We hold a library of transcripts from all the hearings which assist research and future claimants.
We contributed to the OFT's market study into the Personal Current Account Market, a Lending Standards Board study on offsetting of accounts and the possibility of forcing banks to offer accounts where consumers could opt out of having any kind of unauthorised overdraft and thus not incur any fees. We have also met with the Office of Fair Trading on the issues on numerous occassions and taken consumers views forward for consideration.
We have also published a full legal Opinion on the bank charges issue which was very kindly undertaken on a pro bono basis for Legal Beagles by Anthony Scrivener QC for general use and publication.
We are currently working on a response to the BIS consultation where following massive pressure from consumers the government are tackling the EU Consumer Rights Directive to include changes to legislation to allow the courts and regulators to assess the fairness of ancillary charges, such as bank charges, charges for paying by methods other than DD and so on. We'd appreciate your views. This is a direct response to the failure of the OFT to win in the Supreme Court on the bank charges issue.
Alongside the campaign work our members have built a community which,we hope, is friendly and welcoming and enable to assist hundreds of people share experiences and legal information covering a huge range of consumer issues from problems with bailiffs, reclaiming unfair charges to fighting companies attempting to repossess people's homes, and we would like to thank every single member of this site for their contributions over the past three years. Long may it continue.
Improvements in the Personal Current Account Market... 24 May 8.48am
The Office of Fair Trading and Lending Standards Board are working with the industry, regulators and consumer groups to ensure a fairer future for the personal current account. The new measures will, it seems, only be voluntary guidance for now, and it seems not a lot will change. We have long asked for an Opt-in system for unauthorised (or 'informal') overdrafts. They have implemented this in the US for Debit card purchases and ATM Withdrawals - no longer can you use the facilities to overdraw your account and thus incur charges, unless you specifically opt-in to a facility which allows you to do so. Here it seems this is a step too far, and we are heading towards an Opt Out system, which although an improvement will not bring about the changes needed. We have seen the Opt Out system fail with the Barclays reserve account - an extra overdraft extended to its customers for £22 every 5 days of use, which they could chose to Opt Out of. However many people were simply unaware of the change and found the new charging regime difficult to understand and manage financially.
LegalBeagles UPDATE on bank charges position and formal Legal Opinion... 11 May 10.30am
The full Opinion of Anthony Scrivener QC (2-3 Gray's Inn Square - Barristers - AnthonyProfile) is available on the forum, along with some guidance notes on unfairness which supplements that Opinion.The Opinion was very kindly undertaken on a pro bono basis for Legal Beagles by Anthony Scrivener QC for general use and publication. We hope this will assist those complainants, consumercampaigners and solicitors who do wish to continue in the fight, although unfortunately Legal Beagles are disappointed to announce our withdrawal from the legal fight for redress to consumers historically affected by the banks unfair and destructive bank overdraft charging regime...
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This site was launched in May 2007 and thanks to the dedication of the site's team and members has enjoyed steady growth and now attracts around 2000 visitors per day.
The Office of Fair Trading and Lending Standards Board are working with the industry, regulators and consumer groups to ensure a fairer future for the personal current account. The new measures will, it seems, only be voluntary guidance for now, and it seems not a lot will change. We have long asked for an Opt-in system for unauthorised (or 'informal') overdrafts. They have implemented this in the US for Debit card purchases and ATM Withdrawals - no longer can you use the facilities to overdraw your account and thus incur charges, unless you specifically opt-in to a facility which allows you to do so. Here it seems this is a step too far, and we are heading towards an Opt Out system, which although an improvement will not bring about the changes needed. We have seen the Opt Out system fail with the Barclays reserve account - an extra overdraft extended to its customers for £22 every 5 days of use, which they could chose to Opt Out of. However many people were simply unaware of the change and found the new charging regime difficult to understand and manage financially. 
