Don’t Bank On Justice: Illegal Overdraft Charges

WITH banks settling out of court left, right and centre over their infamous illegal overdraft charges, it seemed that finally, the big boys were getting what they deserved.

However, news that a claim against Lloyds TSB has been dismissed by a judge in Birmingham county court will no doubt cheer the banking industry and unfortunately make new claimants thing twice about going head to head with the financial titans.

In throwing Kevin Berwick’s claim for £2,545 out of court, Judge Cook said, “Having held that the charges complained of are not charges for breach of contract but part of the price of the services provided by the bank… he has not satisfied me that he has any ground in law for recovering from the bank the amount of any charges which he has paid to it,”

However, despite the ruling, MoneySavingExpert.com founder Martin Lewis remains positive. Says he: “To all those reclaiming charges it’s a case of ‘don’t panic’. Across the country the banks are still paying out many tens of thousands of pounds a day and the weight of huge numbers of successful reclaims so far easily outweighs this one anomalous result. The banks seem to have got lucky with a sympathetic judge.”

A judge who, no doubt, doesn’t need an overdraft.

Anorak

Posted: 16th, May 2007 | In: Money Comment (1) | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink