Bounced Cheque...

Hi there.

I was wondering if I should report a bounced cheque to the police?

Its just that someone said it is a offence to issue someone a cheque which will bounce.

can someone help?

Reply to
Flexi
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someone knowing that there are no funds to meet it; in reality unless it is part of a big fraud plod would in my opinion not waste much time on it.You do not state full details of how much and what the transaction was etc to be able to give a full answer. Eric

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Reply to
Eric Jones

Its only for about 50 - but thats not the point, I still have to pay charges of 30 for it!!

Reply to
Flexi

In some countries a person can indeed be locked up just for writing a cheque that bounces. The rules are less strict in the UK than elsewhere.

First you should talk to the person who wrote the cheque and ask when funds will be available. It is possible that it will clear, for example, if you represent it at the same time as their salary cheque is paid in. If you get nowhere with this, the cheque can be used to confirm the liability for the money owed if the issue gets as far as a court.

Reply to
dp

You can sue on the cheque without having to prove the debt behind it. How have you incurred charges? Did you go overdrawn because of it?

Reply to
Peter Crosland

account there should be no charge for another bank to return it to you. It is the drawer of the cheque that is likely to be charged 30! Eric

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Reply to
Eric Jones

To do so *knowingly* is fraud. To do so by accident -- well, no-one's going to get too exercised over that. You can reasonably expect the account owner to cover any costs over the bounced cheque, though. If you can *prove* it was deliberate, then try the Police, but you may have difficulty persuading them that it's worth their while.

Jon

Reply to
Jon S Green

A D.D came out on the day it was suposed to clear, thats why i'm being charged... I've tryed to contact the person, but sofar, no reponce.

Reply to
Flexi

I think you'll just have to write this lost £30 off to experience.

I don't really think you have a claim on the payee merely because his cheque failed to clear. Only possible exception I could conceivably see, is if the cheque were in settlement of a contract debt where time of receipt of cleared funds into your account was 'of the essence' of the contract. i.e the payee was clearly aware that this was a fundamental condition of the contract. Then you might have a technical case, but in reality it wouldn't be worth the hassle and cost of pursuing it for just £30.

Rgds

__ Richard Buttrey Grappenhall, Cheshire, UK __________________________

Reply to
Richard Buttrey

In message , Eric Jones writes

No, lots of banks charge for 'returns inwards' as well.

Reply to
john boyle

In message , Flexi writes

What reason for being unpaid was written on the cheque?

Reply to
john boyle

Can you give any examples. Years ago there used to be a small charge of around 4 or so if a cheque bounced inwards but this was dropped by most of the high street banks. Have any re-introduced this charge? Eric

Reply to
Eric Jones

In message , Eric Jones writes

AFAIAA RBS still charge on business accounts.

Reply to
john boyle

But because of the existence of the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999 the term of the contract you have with your bank relating to this charge is likely to be unenforceable. A charge of 30 due to a credit of 50 being bounced doesn't look fair to me.

Bryan

Reply to
Bryan

I think that would be a difficult line to argue in court. Much easier to sue on the cheque and add the consequential loss to the claim, and the Small Claims fee too, of course. Although perhaps sailing a bit close to the wind, the payee was entitled to assume the cheque would clear in time. That it did not seems to be wholly attributable to the drawer's negligence, and so it falls on the drawer to compensate the payee.

Of course, the payee should give the drawer the opportunity not to have to pay the court fee by offering him the chance to settle for the £80 now.

Reply to
Ronald Raygun

Probably not worth starting a claim under £100. In any case, you should sue only after all other avenues have been explored and exhausted.

Remember, though, that you can include in your court claim your costs (time and money) involved in pursuing the claim, both before and during the court process -- apart from solicitors' fees (for claims under £5000) -- so it shouldn't be too difficult to inflate the claim to well over the £100 mark.

It might be worth mentioning, in your initial "pay-up-or-I-sue" letters that if you do sue, the claim will include your time and expenses, and court costs, as well as consequential losses, etc. Might just motivate the other party to pay up now.

Jon

Reply to
Jon S Green

Ronald Raygun wrote

I don't see why.

But if the charge by the bank was covered by the Unfair Terms Regulations I don't see how the court would accept that as part of a successful claim. I am assuming the defendant would be aware of the regulations.

Bryan

Reply to
peopleschampion

Such charges have been around for long enough, and been imposed often enough, that they would by now have been challenged successfully. If this has happened, it's a very well-kept secret.

What the defendant is or is not aware of is not really relevant.

Even if the plaintiff were aware of the Unfair Terms regulations, he might not agree that a term permitting a bank to impose a charge for bouncing a DD is unfair, and so it is completely unreasonable for the defendant to expect the plaintiff to sue the bank for recovery of the charge. In addition, it is obviously unreasonable for the defendant to expect the plaintiff to put himself (the innocent victim here) through the extra hassle involved in a suit he might not even win.

Reply to
Ronald Raygun

Ronald Raygun wrote

I've successfully challenged them a few times. Boringly without the necessity of a court hearing. For more information, in relation to credit cards, see the article in the Times of June 18, 2003 headed Legal action puts a stop to late-payment charges By Joe Morgan which includes:-

"HEFTY penalty charges could be the price that is paid for trying to settle monthly credit card bills by sending a cheque through the post. The monthly ritual of settling a card statement is one of the most popular ways of using a chequebook, according to research by the Association for Payment Clearing Services (Apacs). However, postal delays and the time spent on processing payments can cause heavy late payment charges. Abbey National, Halifax and Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) are among those that impose a

20 fee for late payment.

"I was first charged 20 after MBNA said that a cheque I sent to make a minimum payment arrived late. I disputed the charge and paid the full balance, except for the 20 fee. MBNA then piled on more late payment charges, leaving me with 60 outstanding," he says.

He then got in touch with the Financial Ombudsman Service and threatened legal action on the ground that the charge was in breach of the regulations over unfair terms in consumer contracts. MBNA then withdrew all the late payment penalties.

"Late payment charges in no way reflect the costs that the credit card company incurs for receiving a cheque a few days late," the reader maintains. "This is an outrageous practice. How can they justify this?" A spokesman for MBNA says: "We apply charges for breach of contract. Customers are advised clearly, and explicitly, of this in the terms and conditions."

The Consumers' Association has attacked "punitive" late payment charges, often buried in the small print, and called for banks to send out card statements earlier to give customers more time to pay by post."

I meant that if the defendant was not aware of the Unfair Terms rules the defendant would not bring up the point in his defence.

Whether a term is unfair depends on the particular circumstances of the case.

Bryan

Reply to
peopleschampion

There you go then. No precedent.

That's very encouraging, but I think the situation with bouncings is rather different. The bank is actually involved in some extra work by doing the bouncing and handling the repercussions. So even if late credit card payment charges were deemed, by legal precedent, to be unfair, it would not automatically imply, without further specific precedent, that bounce charges are also unfair.

Quite. That's what I thought you meant. However, it's still not relevant to the proceedings. At the time of the court hearing it would not yet be established whether the term was in fact unfair, and even if it were, it's a matter between the plaintiff and his bank, and it's not reasonable for the defendant to expect the plaintiff to pursue the bank.

It would of course be improper for the plaintiff to pursue both the bank and the defendant, thereby making a profit, the plaintiff can only sue one or the other, and since he's suing the plaintiff anyway (on the cheque), it's a waste of time to sue the bank, especially as the prospect of success is uncertain, while by suing the defendant it is certain.

I'm not sure it does, actually, I think the term's unfairness either pre-exists or not, and the question of fact (whether it's unfair) is determined by looking at the contract and its expected ramifications at the time it is signed, not by real circumstances in which the terms are relied on.

But that's not what I meant. I meant that if the plaintiff is perfectly happy with the terms he cannot be expected to fight them just because it suits someone else.

Reply to
Ronald Raygun

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