Customer sends bailiffs in to seize bank's computers

When Royal Bank of Scotland refused to refund £3,400 charges that Declan Purcell believed he was owed, he sent in the bailiffs.

Stunned customers at his branch of RBS watched as debt collectors seized four computers, two fax machines and a till filled with cash.

The branch manager was told that the items would be sold unless RBS came up with the money owed to Mr Purcell.

Only when the manager gave an undertaking that the debt would be paid did the bailiffs leave.

Mr Purcell said: "I think the bank was pretty shocked when the bailiffs went in. But my view is that this is exactly what they would have done to me."

The move, which will raise a cheer from millions of other bank customers, is part of a consumer fightback against bank charges, which net an estimated £4.5 billion every year.

Every time a current account customer goes overdrawn by as little as £1 most banks will charge around £28, even though the administration cost is only about £4.50.

Then every cheque, direct debit, or card transaction that goes through or is bounced incurs another charge of up to £38.

The Office of Fair Trading is investigating whether banks have implemented these charges unlawfully.

The Daily Mail's Fair Play on Charges campaign and that run by the Consumer Action Group have helped thousands reclaim charges in the past year.

Like other customers Mr Purcell, 48, from East London, had warned his bank that he was prepared to go to court to claim back charges he believes were imposed unlawfully.

In June last year he demanded the refund of £3,400 charges he accrued during the previous six years while running a motorcycle dealership.

RBS ignored the claim so in October Mr Purcell filed an online application to get the money back through the county court.

After 30 days the bank had not responded and so on December 10 the court ruled in Mr Purcell's favour.

It ordered RBS to pay the charges and £120 court costs. When RBS again failed to respond Mr Purcell got the court to give him a warrant of execution, allowing him to order debt collectors to reclaim items from the bank equal in value to the amount he was owed.

Finally on Monday, January 8, a team of debt collectors walked into the busy Camden Town branch in North London, demanded to see the manager, showed their court order and announced that they were repossessing items.

Mr Purcell, who now works for London Underground, said: "I was dismayed by the bank's reaction when I made my claim for a refund – it was so rude and arrogant.

"They thought they were above the law, so it is great to know that customers can use the law in the same way the bank does to get money they are owed."

A spokesman for RBS said: "We are looking into this as a matter of urgency, but early indications suggest that unfortunately due to an administrative error, the bank failed to defend the claim leading to a default judgment being obtained on the branch and a resulting warrant.

"The confusion was cleared up at the branch."

Marc Gander, who set up campaign website Consumer Action Group, which helps consumers get refunds from their banks, said: "I am quite sure that Mr Purcell will not be the last person to send bailiffs in to his bank.

"The continued operation by UK high street banks of their unlawful charges regimes will see to that.

"The heavy-handed debt collecting approach is something that the banks have been handing out to their customers for years. Mr Purcell simply gave them a bit of their own back."