PBA Claim Terms and Conditions

This Agreement forms a contract between Consumer Savings Network (CSN) Ltd and you. You should not sign the Letter of Authority until you have read the Terms of Business and services that CSN provide, including any fees payable to them.

1. Your assessment

In making your claim you will not put yourself at any financial risk. Nor will a successful Packaged Bank Account (PBA) refund from the Bank/Building Society negatively affect your relationship with them. You can carry on with them as normal. If you are still uncertain, please contact us for any further explanations which you need before making up your mind.

2. Procedures

We will gather information from you and from your bank or building society and use this to forward a carefully prepared claim with supporting documents based on the broken FCA principles we have determined in your case. We will contact you when we have received a refund offer from the lender, sometimes in the form of a Settlement Agreement Form for you to sign and return. We generally settle your claim quickly and always without court action. Compensation payments are generally made directly to you from the lender. You will then be responsible for settling our fees with us.

3. Fees

CSN will seek to reclaim any and all PBA policy payments made by you since the inception of your PBA. In most cases we will also get you compensatory interest of 8% for the time they have had your money. If the account is still active, in most cases we will get the Bank or Building Society to offer you a free or reduced fee account in place of the PBA account. CSN charges 25% plus VAT (30% in total) of the total gross compensation awarded to you, the client, for this service. For example, if you win £5,000 in gross compensation, you will need to pay CSN £1,500 in total (£1,250 plus £250 in VAT) for our service. If your account is overdrawn and/or the refund is applied to repay the arrears on your account, CSN will accept interest-free repayments of our fee for up to 6 months. In the absence of you reaching a payment arrangement with us, the 30% fee must be paid to Consumer Savings Network Ltd within 14 days after receiving your refund.

4. Documentation

All we require you to sign are 2 Authority Forms to enable us to act on your behalf and our Terms and Conditions, which acknowledges you accept our terms of service. You may consider making a copy of these documents for your own records.

5. Complaints

We operate an in-house complaints procedure. In the event you feel the need to make a complaint you may lodge this by letter, telephone or email. Your complaint will be investigated wherever possible by a person who was not directly involved in the subject matter of the complaint. We will acknowledge your complaint within 5 business days of receiving it and at that stage we will provide appropriate details of our ongoing complaints procedure. Our full complaints procedure is available here: Complaints — Consumer Savings Network.

6. Early cancellation

You may cancel this contract by notice in writing, email or telephone without any charge within a cooling-off period of 14 days. You will be responsible to notify the bank or credit company of the re-assignment of the claim to yourself if appropriate. No letters, documentary materials, or evidence provided by CSN will be allowed to be used to support your claim.

7. Withdrawal by you

You may withdraw from the contract after the cooling-off period referred to in section 6 above. If we receive written or verbal notification of a successful claim because of the work we have done on your behalf, you will be liable for payment of our standard commission fee of 30% of compensation awarded, as stated in section 3.

8. Your responsibilities

• Please make sure that the details provided are accurate to the best of your memory.
• You should carefully read all documentation we supply you.
• You should ask for assistance from us in explaining anything you do not understand.
• You may be contacted by your Bank/Building Society as a security measure to confirm the details of our claim. If you do not wish to speak with them, please advise them that we are your claims handler and to contact us.
• You must be aware that once a claim is successful and compensation is awarded, you will no longer have the Packaged Bank Account services with that provider, and therefore will not be covered by its provisions.
• You will be responsible for contacting us and providing us with any refund details offered, once you have received a Final Response letter from your Bank/Building Society; also to notify us if you receive a rejection on your claim, so that we can progress your claim accordingly.
• You will be responsible for paying our 30% fee once you have had a successful claim refunded by your Bank/Building Society.

9. Our responsibilities

• We will keep you informed of the progress of your claim.
• We will promptly notify you of any additional steps to be taken or further information we require.
• We will take all proper steps to assure your refund is processed swiftly.
• If necessary, we will review your rejected case for possible submission to the Ombudsman.

10. Data protection

You authorise us to use and discuss information concerning you in the furtherance of your claim. All information will be held and controlled in accordance with the Data Protection Act, with information only being forwarded to those who are registered with the Information Commissioner or a recognised authoritative body. You authorise us to contact you with other services we offer from time to time. Our Privacy Policy is available here: Privacy Policy.

11. Claims registration

Consumer Savings Network Ltd is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, FRN 833181.

Agreement

By signing and returning the Letter of Authority you agree to be bound by these terms of business and appoint CSN to provide Services for such a period as to allow CSN to assess and pursue the Claim (subject to your right to terminate under section 6 above).

Consumer Savings Network is a claims management company. You do not need to use a claims management company to make your complaint to your bank. If your complaint is not successful you can refer to the Financial Ombudsman Service for free.