Credit Card Charge Claim

[Chargeclaim]

Hi,

I was hoping for some advice.

I issued a county court claim against a credit card company on 15/04/16

It was too late for it to be issued that day so it was not issued until after the weekend on 18/04/2016

The credit card company acknowledged service on 26/04/2016

Their last day to issue their defense was 21/05/2016, but that was a Saturday so they had until the end of the day 23/05/2016.

MCOL has updated today and as expected they have issued their defense today.

MCOL have placed the bar to prevent me applying for a default judgement as this is now a defended case, and it states a DQ has been sent to the defendant.

It does not state that anything has been sent to me.

Will I receive a directions questionnaire at the same time as I receive their defense?

[leclerc]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

You are going to have to give more information on this one.

Was it a claim for charges? What was your argument if that was the case?

[Chargeclaim]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

Hi,

Yes it was a claim for charges on my credit card account. I was in a great deal of financial difficulty - I lost my job, defaulted on 11 accounts, and went £2000 overdrawn. I contacted the credit card company but they were unsympathetic, I was being charged up to £36 a month in penalty charges. I raised a complaint but I received their final response within 3 days stating they had done nothing wrong.

The card is still current and I have managed to now clear the balance. The ombudsman rejected my complaint, they stated that they could only investigate if the charges were in line with the T&C's but could not assess their fairness; that would need to be done in court. So I raised a county court claim.

I have only ever raised one previous claim on MCOL - that claim was never acknowledged so I obtained a default judgement and payment a few days later.

I expect that this claim will go all the way to court. I didn't receive anything in the post today so I still do not know what they have put for their defence. I was just confused why on MCOL it said DQ sent to the defendant, but it makes no mention of a directions questionnaire being sent to me.

[EXC]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

Were they default charges ie for not paying on time etc and if so were they above £12?

On the directions I'll ask [MENTION=6]Amethyst[/MENTION] for you.

[EXC]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

Were they default charges ie for not paying on time etc and if so were they above £12?

On the directions I'll ask [MENTION=6]Amethyst[/MENTION] for you.

[Chargeclaim]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

The individual charges were for £12 - but I would get charged £12 for a failed payment, then £12 for a late payment, these would put me over the limit so I was then charged a further £12. Since I was charged £36 a month, I built up £360 worth of charges in less than a year.

[Amethyst]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

Yes the DQ should be received with the defence. If you wish to reply to the defence you'd do that at the same time as you return the DQ.

They have either submitted an application or a defence, and the system will have updated well before you receive anything by post - so you could, if concerned, give the court a call tomorrow to check and see if they could email you ( worth an ask)

[Amethyst]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

The individual charges were for £12 - but I would get charged £12 for a failed payment, then £12 for a late payment, these would put me over the limit so I was then charged a further £12. Since I was charged £36 a month, I built up £360 worth of charges in less than a year.

Think we need an idea of how the statements ran month to month.

You'd make a payment with your card which would fail - charge £12. Then you wouldn't make the minimum payment on time - charge £12. Those two charges together put you over the limit - charge £12. Then you'd pay to get back in the limit, but make more failed payments ?

£12 charges aren't going to be easy to reclaim and it will depend hugely on your account management. If the charges built up on charges then it's reasonable to argue, if you kept attempting to use the card, make failed payments despite being overlimit - then it's not.

We'd like to see your particulars of claim submitted.

OFT credit card charges report from 2006 ( which pretty much wiped out reclaiming of credit card fees) -> https://www.gov.uk/government/upload...445/oft842.pdf - hopefully you have already read that.

[Chargeclaim]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

I paid the card balance by direct debit so it was if that failed that I got a £12 charge, then the charge for being late, then a charge for going over the limit. I would then bring the card back under its limit again - paying the charges and a little interest, but then it would occur the following month.

I made no purchases with the card during this period, but I could not afford to bring the balance down and clear the charges.

I have seen the OFT document - however during this period I did not receive any letters, or phone calls stating I had received any charges. The only email I received was in response to me stating I was in financial difficulty. So even though each charge is £12, I do not view this as a genuine pre-estimate of their costs.

I adapted particulars from another well know website - once I'm on my pc rather than phone I will be able to post those.

[Amethyst]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

Okay cool. So one of the charges each month was for the failed DD - did you try to cancel the DD at any point? Did you also get charged by your bank for the failed DD ?

What card was it ? ( or do you have the terms available which say about the failed DD charge ?) and how is it listed on your statements ?

Think it worked out it cost 50p to claim a DD from someones bank account and have it subsequently bounce. Cost the bank something like 3.2p. But it was quite a long time ago now I last looked into the figures.

[Chargeclaim]

Re: Credit Card Charge Claim

I did eventually cancel the direct debit. I banked with Natwest, they were much more sympathetic to my financial circumstances. They had initially charged me £6 for each direct debit that failed, but they refunded all of their charges once I explained my situation, no complaint necessary.

The credit card itself is with Vanquis Bank. My APR was 59.9% rather than their advertised 39.9% but I was using it to improve my credit so for 3 years I was never charged any interest because I paid the balance in full. Then I got into difficulty and in the space of a year I incurred all of the charges. The balance is now zero again and as of last week I now do not have any debts, but it will take many years for my credit to recover because of my defaulted accounts.

Most firms I have dealt with have been very helpful, removing interest and charges etc and I have cleared the actual debts. It is only Vanquis that has refused. Since the claim is relatively low it seemed worth attempting.