How Much You Can Reclaim

In short, you can claim all unfair charges you have incurred within the previous 6 years.

This includes excessive charges for going overdrawn, letters informing you about bounced cheques and failed direct debits and the likes.

If the action was likely to have only cost the bank a small amount and they have charged you a lot more, then there's a chance of a claim.

If these charges have caused you to incur further charges or interest, then you will also have a case there.

On top of this, you can claim for interest on the amount you are claiming - the interest you would have earned on the money had it been in your account.

But how do you find how much the bank has charged you?

First, if you have your bank statements for the past 6 years then you just need to look through them.

If you haven't kept them all, if you are registered for online banking (or can register) then you may be able to determine the charges from there.

Finally, if neither of these are possible then you have to approach your bank. Asking for copies of back statements can prove quite expensive (and these fee DO NOT count as unfair!!!). But if you know exact dates of charges, then this might be an alternative.

But the usual way is to write to the bank, quoting the Data Protection Act 1998, asking them to tell you for all charges on the account:
• what the offence was
• the date of the offence / charge
• the amount of the fee

The bank has, by law, only 40 working days to respond. But it is allowed to charge you a fee not more than £10, so it's worth while including in this letter the full £10 fee made payable to the bank.

If your bank tries to send you a copy of your statements they can try to charge you for that. Therefore, make certain that you tell the bank you are using the Data Protection Act 1998 to get a list of all charges.

Expenses

You can also claim expenses incurred in making your claim, although this can be best left to the court stage and used as a bargaining tool before then. Simply put, if the bank is told that you will accept repayment now, or repayment plus costs if they don't accept that, then there's a financial benefit to them to accept.

Reasonable costs include court costs and a recent case has also included costs of preparing the case. To claim for this, keep a record of how much time you spend preparing your case then include a charge at £9.25 per hour (the legal entitlement).

> Next, Disadvantages to Reclaiming.