LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

[orfoster]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

PS - I'm on BBC Question Time tonight. Who knows if I'll get asked my questions. NHS related.

[orfoster]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

http://www.law-lords.com/blog-detail...ourt-of-appeal

M1

They'd argue unreasonable behaviour which was what they suggested yesterday.

[Amethyst]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Presumably on the audience rather than the panel ? Will keep an eye out for you, Twitter is always good for a giggle during Question Time.

[orfoster]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Presumably on the audience rather than the panel ? Will keep an eye out for you, Twitter is always good for a giggle during Question Time.

Haha I thought I wouldn't specify, I thought I could make myself sound all important. yeah in audience. It starts for me at 6, I'll be home ready to watch it and tweet accordingly lol.

[Fred]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Hi everyone,

Well what a day yesterday!

Firstly, Philippa Simmons (Head of Lloyds Legal) came up to me while Duffy was distracting Tom, to shake my hand and tell me "I'm here if you need anything at all".

Apart from the Judge's conduct it was interesting, the Judge was quite rude to Tom in Court, he called me a 'busy body' and was entirely on the banks side from the outset.

There was also a strong suggestion from the other side that I have been pressured into this action by my Legal Team.

So I thought I'd address this here, given I am well aware that this forum is monitored by the banks...

As some of you know, my day job is that I work for a trade union, I also volunteer with the CAB and come into contact with people who are struggling to put food on the table on a daily basis, in nearly every case those people have debts with massive amounts of charges and have been given a 6 year sentence for those charges and are having to turn to Food Banks to make ends meet.

Although I have no authority in law or otherwise, in answer to the Judges question "what business is it of Mr Foster-Burnell to challenge these terms on behalf of others?" I hope I've explained why actually I made the decision I did to attempt to give those people who have no clue about their rights, a voice.

It was great to meet EXC and Kafka yesterday and as EXC has said, the Judge commended DDJ Stockdale in his decision.

Obviously at the end Duffy threatened me with costs, should this matter go forward and they didn't apply for costs on this occasion because it was my legal team who wanted to pursue this issue and not me, frankly that's insane, it was absolutely my decision following the advice I was given.

We will know more in the next week or so about any potential next steps, which I'll reflect on of course but given their threat of costs against me I'll have to think long and hard about any potential implications.

It remains concerning that at the end of the day, there is no 'adequate or effective means' for consumers in this country to prevent the continued use of unfair terms, apart from bringing individual claims in the County Court.

Thanks to everyone for their continued support, this forum is a great place

(It remains concerning that at the end of the day, there is no 'adequate or effective means' for consumers in this country to prevent the continued use of unfair terms, apart from bringing individual claims in the County Court)

You can be assured it will become more transparent & hopefully your comment addressed because ADR & regulation is exactly what this needs..............I am not about to give up with this now albeit me just a humble soul but determined.

I come from a different angle but the issues are the very same & those who work for us should dam well do their job.

[Kafka]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Firstly, Philippa Simmons (Head of Lloyds Legal) came up to me while Duffy was distracting Tom, to shake my hand and tell me "I'm here if you need anything at all".

Did you ask what was on offer?

[orfoster]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

No but was going to ask if she agreed to pay out for everyone then I'll drop the case...

[Guest]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Haha I thought I wouldn't specify, I thought I could make myself sound all important. yeah in audience. It starts for me at 6, I'll be home ready to watch it and tweet accordingly lol.

Well I for one am still impressed, currently one of my favorite programs

[leclerc]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

The judgment stands so it can be used as persuasive. The arguments used can be used in other cases but it isn't an auto win. It's not dependant on hardship.

We wouldn't want to send anyone into court on their own with this as it is a complex argument and a loss could be quite damaging at the moment. Will wait to hear Tom's views on going forwards with Oli's case but there are a few other irons in the fire.

What we could do with doing is looking at the terms for all the banks, primarily those terms which state they can change fees unilaterally and you have no right to close your account whilst overdrawn.
The above covers almost all of them because, although they will send out notifications of fee changes usually as statement inserts, all banks will not shut an account if the account is overdrawn. This btw will apply to joint accounts being changed to single accounts.

Remember ages back we were saying consumers should be able to close their bank account with an overdraft debt and repay it over a set period without incurring further charges ( just standard overdraft interest). I think that we should start pushing for that again so consumers have a right to say 'No More' and move to another bank without the fear of the overdraft debt increasing so rapidly.
Do you mean, more of less, that the overdraft should be able to be transferred? I do know that some of the banks' debt management practices were that the overdraft was extended and then lowered over a set period of time so that eventually, the idea was the allow the debtor(for want of a better word) to be able to get their overdraft back to within it's limit.

Also a credit card style term that you can chose to close your account and repay over say six months if the bank decide to increase their charges, or change their charging structure, so consumers get 30 days notice of changes and have the right to close their account and repay the overdraft rather than face the new or increased fees.
We have had this discussion over credit card rate hikes but AFAIK the only option was to pay off the balance and go elsewhere which for people with poor credit histories is not ideal.

The other idea we had was banks invoicing us each month and us chosing when to pay and where to pay from, and the OD charges end up as a separate debt that can have interest charged upon if not paid within 30 days but can't affect the overdraft, stops banks raiding your account to take their charges, and stop charges being incurred because last month you had a massive shortfall due to, well, charges. But we won't get that.

What if you refuse to pay in 30 days and have racked up further charges. There has to be a balance between reasonable charges and financial education to be honest and people have to accept that there is an issue.
So rights for the consumer to close the account while overdrawn seems sensible to me.

Personally, I'd like to see advisors in banks who properly look at budgetting for customers without there being an underlying task of prioritising the banks' own debt(natwest moneysense advisors) or selling bank products(natwest moneysense advisors). I would like to see someone who is specifically independent from the bank itself because being able to repay a debt in full to the bank rather than incurring potentially costly litigation would be better for both parties. However, this will never happen.

[leclerc]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

No but was going to ask if she agreed to pay out for everyone then I'll drop the case...

Rather than quoting your post on yesterday I thought I'd quote the shortened one. If Lloyds were there then clearly they were unsure of what would go down yesterday(no pun was intended btw).
There are small chinks of light coming out of what happened in Taunton, so whether you proceed or not, you've at least opened the door just a little bit and that is most definitely a start Oli. The door needs opening more and the windows need smashing(metaphorically not literally) at the banks.

I might watch question time or merely hear about it later from you whether you were on it or not(then I can watch it on iplayer ).

[walkers40]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Does anyone know the latest on Olivers latest hearing (due end Oct 2014)

[EXC]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Does anyone know the latest on Olivers latest hearing (due end Oct 2014)

http://www.legalbeagles.info/forums/...343#post485343

[pt2537]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

It's obviously being considered but there are wider discussions going on about the way forward generally.

The good thing that came from yesterday was that although he made a point of saying it wasn't for him to do so he appeared to endorse the main finding of the Taunton judgment (that the terms were unfair) by describing it as ''exemplary'', ''well thought out'', ''considered'' and ''commendable'', which gives us confidence for other individual challenges.

Perhaps a transcript of that hearing would be a good idea then, as that could be used to support the DDJ ruling in Taunton

[Kafka]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

Perhaps a transcript of that hearing would be a good idea then, as that could be used to support the DDJ ruling in Taunton

I bet they would redact the bit where judgey threw a wobbly and shouted at Tom :juge:

He was a grumpy old chuffer, but none of us expected that :blah:

[pt2537]

Re: LegalBeagle Wins Bank Charge Case - Lloyds Overdraft Terms deemed Unfair

I bet they would redact the bit where judgey threw a wobbly and shouted at Tom :juge:

He was a grumpy old chuffer, but none of us expected that :blah:

no he couldnt, the Judge has no input on the transcript of proceedings, only the judgment itself does he get to approve. If you use Posib the transcribers i use, they will put everything in