This is just one reason why I consider banks to be fair Game and in need of tigher legislative conrol which we will never get from any UK governmnet acting under the presnt coannon fobbr idiology.

Banks and Insurances have raped and milked the UK almost dry for years, often ruining many rural communities. Read and learn.


Exposed: Lloyds' dirty tricks on fee claims
Dennis Rice, Mail on Sunday
29 July 2007

The cynical methods used by one of Britain's biggest banks to avoid refunding customers' unfair bank charges are exposed today.




High Street giant Lloyds TSB, which has been accused of overcharging customers 300m a year, has issued staff with guidelines on how to deal with complaints.
In a 16-page training pack it instructs workers to:

Reject first-time claims, even if they are legitimate.

Offer a maximum payout of 750.

Offer immediate settlements only to those who are 'very ill' - or dying.

Not refund or waive interest.

Banks and building societies make an estimated 1.7bn a year from levying charges of up to 39 each time a customer goes overdrawn or bounces a cheque.

Since Financial Mail on Sunday and consumer groups began highlighting these 'unfair' profits and campaigning for a fairer system, ms of customers have asked their banks for a refund of the charges.

Lloyds TSB has been so inundated with claims for refunds that it has set up a special Recovery Centre at its offices in Andover, Hampshire - and has had to draft in agency workers to help its hundreds of 'customer care' staff.

The training booklet is the first concrete written evidence of the banks' seeming determination to cheat their clients out of reclaiming the fees.

One complaint handler for the bank, who contacted the Mail on Sunday, said: 'Cynical does not even begin to describe it.

'I was placed by a recruitment agency, working from 5pm until 1am for about 200 a day to work in this nondescript building on the outskirts of Andover. I was one of about 50 people just dealing with complaints about service charges - we were told the bank was receiving more than 500 a day.

'This training pack was given to me on my first morning and I was told I had to adhere to it as this was the company policy - no deviating. The booklet was telling us to reject customers asking for refunds, then to palm the more persistent ones off with nuisance money.'

He added: 'It did not matter if the charges had been unfair or if the records showed the applicant was owed thousands of pounds in refunds.

'We were told to offer those who wrote in after the initial rejection refunds of up to 750 - but for most the claim was going back five to ten years, meaning the money people were owed ran into the thousands.

'The bank's attitude was very much that they could take it or leave it and we were always told that it was to be stated that this was a goodwill offer, and in no way an acceptance that the customer had a case.'

The Banking Ombudsman investigates complaints from customers about their bank, but it is a lengthy and timeconsuming process. Banks, for example, are given up to eight weeks to respond to the original complaint.

'Offering people 750 to just go away was a quick and easy option,' said the Lloyds TSB worker. 'We would tell them it would be in their bank in two days. What none of them knew was that they could still pursue the bank for the rest of the money.'

This year, bank customers have reclaimed more than 200m in overdraft fees. Campaigners argue the real cost to a bank for a bounced cheque is only 2.50.

Andrew Oxlade, editor of This Is Money, which has led the campaign to highlight unfair bank charges, said: 'One has always strongly suspected that bank staff have not come up with these sort of dirty tricks on their own, particularly when they sometimes sound like they are reading from a set script.

'Now we have the first concrete evidence that at least one of the big banks is actually schooling workers in underhand tactics. It is quite simply appalling.'

Nothing new here, banks will always start by negoitating low. Its the same with any business, if you have a strong case insist on what you believe is recoverable in the event of legal action. Finally sick to a timeline as outlined by law and keep the pressure on. Interestingly only banks are currently under fire at the moment.