Bank Threatens to close all personal A/cs

S

senni

Registered User
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AIB has wrote to my brother threatning to close all his personal accounts and call in all debts without him authorising same.

Can they do this ?

Background

He has an overdraft facility of 5,000 and they let him go over it by 1,000. He pays 166 every month to try to get it down. ie his childbenefit.He has lost his job and is currently applying for welfare.Not recd yet.

He has a personal loan of 16,000 which is 3 months in arrears.

He has banked with them for 15 years with no problems

He spoke to the manager in June explaining all the above and yet the treatning leters still come

WHAT CAN HE DO ???
 
senni said:
Can they do this ?
Click to expand...

Yes.

senni said:
WHAT CAN HE DO ???
Click to expand...

Pay the arrears immediately or make an arrangement that the bank will agree to. Alternatively, if he can do neither of these as Theresa says he should contact MABS immediately as there is long waiting lists.

Unfortunately the 15 years custom means nothing to the bank, unless of course he still had money or was a high profile property developer who owed them €450million!
 
Can they close your accounts? YES they can.. they give you 21 days notice of when they will close your accounts so my advice would be to open another bank account as soon as possible (advice i got from MABS) then contact mabs and bring all the letters with you
 
Let them know that they have forced him to pay his child benefit to pay off the arrears and that he will bring this to the ombudsman. It is illegal under Consumer Credit Act. This and MABS may help them change their tune; however that's not to say they can't and wont proceed.
 
thanks for your reply but what do you mean "this is bigger than closing a current account " Can you expand on this ?

Can he deal with this without mabs as they have a waiting list for 3 months...what should he do ?

thanks a million
 
senni said:
thanks for your reply but what do you mean "this is bigger than closing a current account " Can you expand on this ?

Can he deal with this without mabs as they have a waiting list for 3 months...what should he do ?

thanks a million
Click to expand...

Hiya Senni

The fact that the account might get closed down is serious, but try not to lose sight of the fact that the overdraft is past it's limit and the PL is in Arrears.

The fact that he lost his job means that he needs some help with regards to how to deal with this.

MABS would be excellent for advice and would help in trying to manage the arrears and reaching an agreement to pay resolve the problem before it gets really out of hand.
 
What arrangment did he come to with the bank manager in June?

He can go directly to his bank and try to negotiate a repayment plan that he can afford. He has broken his overdraft arrangment, he has broken his payments on his personal loan so the bank are well within their rights to close his accounts. Does he have any savings, can he borrow from a family member if he needs to in order to repay the 22K. Has he a car he could sell to repay the debt. I recommend you do the money makeover section on this website to get better advice on money issues.

Deas - the bank have not forced him to pay the child benefit. He has chosen to use this money to do this himself.
 
Hi Bronte

what happens when they close his accounts ? as he is still waiting on social welfare to come back to him...the 21 days are nearly up !
 
I assume the money then becomes due forthwith and the banks will get their solicitor who deals in bad debts to follow it up with court proceedings. It's far better to come to an arrangment with the bank then to bury your head in the sand. Does your brother have any assets (house, site, car)? You have not said what happened in the meeting with the bank manager? I recommend he do the money makeover section on this website to get better advice.
 
Hi Bronte,

The manager told him that he had to find the money somewhere to bring it back under its limit.( ie from 6100 back to 5000 )He woudnt except that my brother was reducing it by 166 per month with the childrens allowance.He started quoting a european financial law to him called "Basel" and that this had to be done in three months or thats it.He said there was no leeway with this directive. My brother at that stage was lost because he didnt know what " Basel " was and got totally confused.

What id like to know is why did they pay his DDs over his limit, it wasnt just one, its about 10...i cant understand that part myself, why didnt they unpay them in the first place as this went on for over two weeks, why didnt his account flag up

Thanks for your time
 
Hi there
I just read all the posts, and am curently on the same situation but a bit ahead on the story...Ive been there.
Heres what I think about it:
You have asked if the bank can close the accounts-yes they can, they will give you 21 days warning and they will then close the accounts whether or not its in debt. This is a good thing on my opinion, you dont want to do business with a bank that is not there for you when you need them.open up another account asap, I personally recommend An Post as they are good to deal with, post office is opened on saturday and they dont have account fees.
-second issue was the pay from a child benefit, I have done it myself during more than 1 year, I realize now that it was a bit mistake - again this is my opinion. Your brother needs to contact MABS ASAP, and I mean it. sit with one of the debt advisors and put all the debts on the table, make a proper financial statement and work from there. He should then make an offer to the bank according to his means, this should be realistic and keep reviewing avery 3 months, once there is some money coming in, he should be ok. They will refer it to their legal team and there will be a lot of nasty letters coming at the door, at some stage i was getting 3 every day...pass them onto mabs and dont get involved, this avoids stress. keep your head up and look for a job, keep your life. once it goes to the legal team, their solicitors can make long term arrangements, so on that sense its actually better if it goes to the solicitors...that where i am now. keep paying every month even if it is 20 euros per month if thats what you can afford and stablish your priorities, mortgage, food, clothing first...those are primary needs.
If is there anything else i can do, pls do not hesitate to contact me, I will happy to help as much as i can.
By the way, from what i heard, AIB is actually easy going in terms of debt, BOI would be way worse.best of luck
 
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