Brunel Franklin Launches New Service After Employee Tackles Bank

Georgie Dwyer has just secured a whopping £2,500 refund from online bank First Direct

A Brunel Franklin employee recently asked her boss what to do about excessive bank charges, and - following the company’s recommendation that she should pursue a claim against the bank -
Georgie Dwyer has just secured a whopping £2,500 refund from online bank First Direct. With Brunel Franklin’s help, Georgie took First Direct to task for levying excessive charges on her personal bank account. And the success has prompted Brunel Franklin to launch a new service to help thousands of other people fight back against the unfair penalties that earn banks millions of pounds a year at the expense of their customers.

Georgie Dwyer, who works as a marketing executive for the financial services group, faced frequent default charges on her current account which were sometimes as high as £75. Over a six-year period, the fees added up to a shocking £2,846.50 – not including the interest that would have been payable.

With their experience of the financial services industry, Brunel Franklin was well aware of regulations governing the charges and was able to highlight to Georgie the underhand methods employed by some banks to deter customers from trying to reclaim their cash. “It added up to a lot of money and I was determined to get it back,” said Georgie. Banks obviously have to set fees but they should be proportionate to the actual costs incurred and that often isn’t the case.” Armed with the relevant facts and figures, Georgie, 27, fired off a series of letters to First Direct and within weeks she was celebrating a victory after the bank accepted her argument and paid up.

“After speaking with my manager I understood the legal position, and was prepared for any stalling tactics but people without experience of the financial sector are at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to mounting a challenge, which is why it’s so important to seek specialist help,” she explained. Many banks have been charging excessively for years and the issue has recently come under scrutiny again. Last autumn the Office of Fair Trading announced it would be working with the Financial Services Authority and British Bankers’ Association to gather facts about the fairness of bank charges but in the meantime customers all over the country are still having large sums taken automatically from their accounts.

“Another concern, quite aside from the unfairness of these penalties, is that they also contribute to exacerbating the problem of debt,” warned Georgie. “If you exceed an overdraft limit and are charged for that, you could end up with insufficient funds to cover cheques for example and then incur even more charges so the situation becomes a vicious circle. People are generally loyal to their banks especially if, like me, they’re perfectly happy with other aspects of the service. They might be reluctant to cause a fuss but they’ve got every right to question excessive costs.”

Ian Allison, corporate relations director for BrunelFranklin.com and conkersclaims, said Georgie’s experience was yet another example of poor practice on the part of financial institutions.

”With our experience in the compensation marketplace, we were able to guide Georgie through the process of taking on her bank. The approach proved so successful that we have decided to offer the service to anyone else who would like to claim against unfair bank charges, but who may feel unable to handle the claim themselves, for whatever reason.

“Everyone accepts that banks are in the business of making money and need to charge customers for their services but the amounts they’ve been getting away with over they years are staggering. It is impossible to justify penalties of £35 or more for sending out a standard letter when someone goes into the red by a few pounds for example,” he pointed out.

“Banks are obviously alive to the possibilities of people seeking repayments and some are already trying to scare them off which is why a service such as ours can make all the difference. We have long experience of such responses and won’t be intimidated by bully boy tactics. It really is a disgraceful state of affairs and we are determined to help as many people as possible to get a fair deal,” he added.

If you think charges on your bank account have been unduly high then contact Brunel Franklin to find out if their expert team can help. If there are grounds for requesting a refund, the company will pursue the claim from beginning to end on your behalf. For further details, take the sixty second test at www.conkersclaims.com/banktest.aspx or telephone 0800 051 54 51 free of charge.