Halifax means always having to say it's sorry

S G writes: In November, I started to arrange a bank account with Halifax for the small company that owns the freehold of our block of flats. The leaseholders in the block, four of us, are the shareholders. This seemed to me a relatively simple matter.

Six months later, it had proved to be the exact opposite. I cannot begin to summarise all the ins and outs, but it involved at least 20 visits to your branch, innumerable phone calls and at least half a dozen letters of apology from the bank. Those aside, it kept changing its mind about every aspect of the business: about what sort of information it required from you, and what sort of account (if any) it could offer you. I am not sure that my involvement helped much, except to crank up the apologies.

After nine months, you have, understandably, gone elsewhere. Halifax has written you a letter of apology and sent £150 of Marks & Spencer vouchers as a gesture for all the time you have wasted. If only the bank were as good at banking as it is at apologising.

Clydesdale horsed round with my loan

F M writes: My fixed-rate mortgage with Clydesdale expired in May, and I asked it to move me to an offset mortgage. The arrangement fee was deducted at the end of that month. Since then, the bank has been unable to advise me when the new offset will be activated and continues to charge me the normal variable rate. I’d already moved a significant sum into a savings account to take advantage of the offsetting, which is probably not getting the best rate of interest. I have written and phoned but have had no reply.

Clydesdale agrees there was an unacceptable delay. The offset mortgage is now up and running, and you have been refunded the extra interest you paid while on the variable rate. The bank has also waived the £299 arrangement fee as a gesture of goodwill.

Driven mad by Direct Line

C S writes: In 2001 there was a collision outside a building I own, which resulted in one of the cars damaging the rendering and external decoration. The driver was insured with Direct Line. I was slow to put in a claim as I did not realise the extent of the damage, but eventually consulted a builder who provided me with an estimate of £492.25 in April 2005. I submitted this to the insurer, it was approved and so I had the work done. Since then I have been trying, but failing, to get any payment.

I have no doubt your builder is good at building, but he is not so hot with his paperwork, which was one of the causes of the delay. Direct Line says it had two problems: first, the Vat number your builder quoted was incorrect and, second, that the details supplied were “sketchy” and insufficient for it to pay up. The insurer says it tried several times to get a response from your builder without success. I’m not clear why it didn’t contact you. If it had then everything would have been easily explained.

Your builder had deregistered for Vat between sending you his estimate and sending his invoice, which explained that problem. While the invoice was brief and maybe unsatisfactory from an insurance point of view, the estimate contained much fuller details and seemed to me perfectly acceptable. A little nous on the insurer’s part at this stage would have gone a long way. Anyway, I passed on all the information you gave me, and the insurer has agreed to pay your claim in full.

British Gas take more than I owe

N F writes: We use British Gas to supply our electricity and our usage has been fairly constant over many years. But for some time the company has withdrawn far greater sums by direct debit than appears warranted. I have phoned many times and although staff have been unfailingly courteous and have promised to put matters right, nothing has been done. I believe I am owed a significant amount of money.

This appeared to be a failure of communication rather than a matter of wrong bills. You had a meter installed in 2004 and British Gas worked on estimates only for the next two years. A reading at that point showed you owed £1,417.

BG says it wrote to you saying it would not collect this in one go but, rather, would collect it in a number of instalments of £236.50 per month, which also covered your current consumption. The backlog has now been repaid and your direct debit has reverted to £50 per month. The company is writing to explain all this to you, and has sent you and your wife a bunch of flowers as an apology for not making this clear earlier.

Another reader, LB, was being threatened by British Gas over nonpayment of £59.21 although he had paid it four months earlier, and had sent copies of his bank statement to the company twice, by recorded delivery, to prove it.

As LB suspected, the money had been sitting in a suspense account all this time, as it had been allocated to an incorrect account number. British Gas has now finally traced it, and as LB had in the meantime paid the bill a second time, to fend off court proceedings, it has refunded the full sum, together with compensation to cover his postage and phone costs.

No such number, no such code...

D T writes: I am requesting your help in obtaining money which has become “lost” in Nationwide’s internet banking system.

That is a nicely neutral way of putting it. As you admit, the reason the money went astray was because you had been attempting to transfer just over £1,000 from your own Nationwide account to your father-in-law’s account at Lloyds TSB, but unfortunately the sort code he gave you for his account was wrong; no wonder it did not reach its destination. This sort of problem has become more and more common as people increasingly use the internet to transfer money. It really is important to get the sort code and account number right.

The problems in retrieving money lost in this way can be significant, especially if you have the bad luck to hit on a combination of sort code and an account number that is actually for someone else’s account. If that person then refuses to give the money back, sometimes the only option is to pursue them in court.

In your case, your money was eventually found and has now been returned. It took longer than it should have, and Nationwide is giving you £100 for the delay.

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