Hi It would be helpful for me to be able to read the section of their T+C's re interest rates and if it has a section re changes. I know these contracts are full of jargon but if someone could retype it i could see how it stands up to scrutiny and if it is compliant with different legislation and guidelines. It would also be useful to sort out a plan of attack, There is no point everyone just firing off letters we would need to form a structure and precedent and once the precedent is set then everyone else could follow. There are several areas that could be followed and obviously the first one is the PPi. I realise that not everyone took out PPI and the main thrust is the intersest rate hike but if [when] we are successful on the first PPi mis-selling issue they are prone then to addressing the interest rate hike. That then allows us to get them in a corner and to proceed from there!! Mike

Hi Mike..

Here's the relevant section:

7) We may from time to time vary our interest rate. We may increase or reduce our interest rate to reflect a change which has occurred, or which we reasonably expect to occur in interest rates generally or to ensure that our business is carried on prudently, efficiently and competitively. The interest rate on your account will in any twelve month period vary more than twice the variation in the Finance House Base Rate published by the finance and leasing association during the same period. If for any reason, the finance and leasing Association ceases to publish the Finance House Base Rate we mayrefer the variation in our interest rates to any other base rate which in our reasonable opinion best matches that rate.

8) If there is a variation in the interest rate under condition 7, or if you make your first payment more than 30 days after this Agreement begins, we may by notice to you, vary the amount of monthy payments you will make. This will ensure that your loan will be paid in full subject to any accrued charges, on the date on which the last of the monthly payments is due.

I have several letters from FP regarding increases in the interest charge, A letter dated13/12/08 cites the 'Bank of England Interest Rate Increase' for the reason for an increase of 0.5%, others dated Feb 07, Apr07 & July 07 refer to BoE and FHBR rate increases and another dated Aug 08 is more vague and just states 'Interest Rate Change due to reflect the underlying costs associated with borrowing'

I sent off my claim for Mis-sold PPI today (recorded delivery). Now waiting eagerly for their response.

Cheers! Aly

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On a crusade against Firstplus

First; First Plus is closing their offices in Cardiff although on the face of it might sound perhaps good news it doesn't have any implications for its customers apart from ringing [contacting]them. I would assume Barclays, firstplus or Barclaycard will write informing of this.

The contract clause re interest rate states [in short] that they can put up interest rates as economic conditions dictate or if any rate changes, this could mean several rates and not just the base rate, LIBOR for instance [the rate banks lend to each other] WHAT IT DOES state is, is that if the rate changes then that rate increase/decrease would be passed on. At this point i have to admit that I have never heard of this other rate they mention I have never seen it in a financial paper, tome, exam paper or any literature.

I've only had a quick peek as i'm in and out but my first thought is the OFT [office of fair trading] for clarification as if they are able tp put rates up when lending rises then subsequently they should put them down. I will have to find out about this rate and check it for movement against the base rate and also the LIBOR rate, Bear with me

Mike

I have found this FHBR rate is quite an obscure rate it is normally used for specialist car/marine lending alongside HP and leasing. I have all the rates from 2000 to present it would help if people could let me know when FP put the rate up to check with changes in this, Libor and the bank rate one of the problems is that when the bank rate came down this year Libor went up because what happened to the flow of money between the banks affected by the original crunch, that said it would be interesting to see if there was a rate rise by FP when there was no economic reason for it.

I have done a fair bit of digging on FP and they are a nasty piece of work which lends me to conclude that nearly all action should be taken through relevant regulation bodies and have little dealing with them or their masters except for initial letters which is fro forma for dealing with complaints i.e. giving them the right to reply before taking action. One of their biggest scams was at one time they were offering a reasonable rate for credit impaired borrowers of say 12% bit this turned out to be a monthly rate when borrowers assumed it was an annual rate. FP and any lender can charge any rate they like but when advertising they nust always advertise the APR for true comparison this is where you might see say the Abbey advertising a rate of 5% bot the APR is 5.2%. The difference is the 5% represents the pay [monthly[ amount and the APR is the rate including any charges [insurance, fees etc] so if FP advertised a rate of 12% they should have advertised an APR of at least 144%.

I need to hear from anyone this has happened to!!

and

1 Everyone who has taken out PPI

2 Those with pre-existing medical conditions and who having taken out PPI

3 The self employed or on benefits who have taken out PPI

4 Anyone who has claimed on the PPI

5 Anyone who has tried to claim and have been turned down

Hello to all FP customers seeking answers!! I just phoned FP after getting worked up into another state of dibelief that another morning post delivery had gone by without a letter from them announcing a rate cut. As expected a kind customer service rep explained rates were under review and that they don't follow BOE rate but the FHBR and other factors. He quoted all the rate cuts in the past that we have had but still no answer as to when one would happen this time round. He confused me with lots of financial information and I as usual resulted in gettin worked up and tole him it makes me very happy everyday to know if my house were ever to be repossessed that FP would never get a penny of the money they would be owed!!!

Stupidly I have not kept all letters relating to rate changes, I know they have put rates up when BOE has gone down and I now my rate started at 7.9% in July 07 and has probably gone up a further 2% since then. My payments started at £408 and are now £435.

I did purchase PPI and am due a repayment of about 8k in July 10 which is the only thing that keep me with them. I had looked into PPI misselling and seemed to work out this wouldn't apply in my case. However, seeing Crocky reply to someone else prompting a look at how much you could actually claim from them as opposed to the actual charge for the insurance makes me think again on this issue! Are you saying Crocky that if you have paid more for an insurance than you could actually benefit from it then it was missold??

I am happy to fight in whatever way against FP, just not sure how far we would get on the interest rate issue.

Emma

Hi Crocky,

After looking at different sites, it appears that FP are increasing rates to different people at different times, as i have seen someone get 2 rate rises this year in Feb and Sep, Welshdresser got a rate rise in Aug. You would have thought that they would raise it for everyone and not just individuals! surely they must be digging themselves into a big hole! I am now starting to think that because i only took out my loan with them in Jan this year, that they are just waiting till i have been with them over a year before they start to raise my rate!

Have just checked my rate out and it says APR 6.9%, so does that mean i am paying 0.57% monthly?

Evening everyone..

First - Welcome to our thread Emma. Its good to hear from other disgruntled customers willing to join our fight.I also thought I had no cause to claim a mis-sold PPI from firstplus but after Mike (Crocky) pointed out the cost of the policy against the benefits, I felt it was worth a try. I felt secure in the fact that I could claim the insurance premiums back at the end of the loan, but then thought about the interest charged on the premium and the limits to any claim. Plus, have you considered if you needed to claim for just a couple of months? You'd pay £8000 for a couple of months cover and the opportunity to claim back the premium at the end would be gone. Mike certainly opened my eyes to the big con this is.

Sean - I agree that looking at the comments in other forums, FP seem to be changing rates for different customers at different times, are they looking at customers individually to see how much they can push their rates up and fleece them further? Some customers seem to be paying much higher interest than me - I admit some of this may be due to that individual's risk due to previous bad credit & payment history, but it worries me that they can seemingly pluck a figure from thin air and how far will they push my rates up in the future just because they can?

Mike - you are our hero right now and your knowledge has been invaluable and I certainly appreciate the time & effort you are putting into this. Are you also a FP customer or are you just helping us out in kindness.

My interest rate changes are as follows:

Sept 06 - agreement signed APR 7.7%

Dec 06 - increase to 8.2%

Feb 07 - increase to 8.5%

April 07 - increase to 9%

July 07 Increase to 9.3%

March 08 - decrease to 8.5%

August 08 - increase to 9.3%

We have never defaulted or made a late payment so our payment history does not affect these rates in any way.

If this is not in line with whichever base rate they follow - I guess the next step to complain to the ombudsman??

Cheers everyone !! Aly

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On a crusade against Firstplus

Evening Aly,

It is getting harder to see how FP can follow any sort of base rate with their increases and decreases, by the looks of it they are playing it any way they want, they obviously don't expect anyone to cotton on to the way they are doing it!

Just remember Aly, "he who laughs last, laughs longest", we'll have our day with FP

Solidarity brother!!

Aly

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On a crusade against Firstplus

Emma the interest rate hikes are a bit of a grey area at the moment, even though you haven't kept your notices your bank statrements would show them, failing that if you get on ok with your bank one of the staff might look at the history for free please don't pay for copy statements what I'm trying to do with that is show that they haven't acted in either good faith or with just cause if i can prove something then it would be a case of contacting the OFT for a ruling.

An obvious alternative to that is to barrage the press with complaints and get Barclays [who will ultimately decide what happens even though they have wound up FP] to act.

the problem is this fhbr rate which to give you a snapshot was

2003...................4% [3.5%in one month]

2004................between 4 and 5 %

2005.....................5%

2006....................5% all year 5.5% Nov, Dec

2007......................between 5.5% amd 7%

2008,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,between 6 and 6,5% [last month]

From this we can see that the rate has generally gone up. though from the high of 2007 it dipped a point to 6% it is too early yet to make assumptions on this I need to get as much information and will probably contact the OFT to determine certain things and to re-look at the wording of the FP contract and ally it to other things I am looking at at the moment notably advice given by the OFT to secured lending companies regarding their attitde to customers I don't want to get into this at the moment as it is rather complex.

The problem with FP is their rate is variable, this is unusual in the lending industry both secured and unsecured.

The ppi is a different matter and most of the disputes and claims are more clear cut. I have certain information at hand and am trying to ascertain figures on judgements, FO decisions and other information to cast as many people within the net of being able to claim against FP and other lending companies.

A friend on here [if you have read all the posts] is now claiming against FP for mis-selling PPI, I expect that claim to be successful it depends on how quickly Barclays are willing to finalise the claim. In these circumstances Financial companies try to limit the damage not in an individual case but in public knowledge so as to not attract more claims but of course we are waiting to file every case once we establish the precedent. So the answer to your question is if you think you've been mis-sold and haven't claimed as yet you have a very good case even if you have claimed then you still have a case. If you can give me the figures then when we are in position we will file claim 2.

Mike

Hi to everyone and apologies I'm up to my eyes at the moment and when I check out my messages and get on the site it only shows me the last post which I reply to and then find there are previous posts which I should read first. You will get a snapshot of what I'm doing in my previous post, to Emma.

Because I'm juggling about 12 cases at the moment it would be helpful if someone with time could keep a record of whats happening, I would suggest you start with the night FP had their party [Chriatmas] for media purposes. post party. and our current claim and pre party interest rate changes.

This would allow us to table a time line and get new posters [on this site] up to speed. The interest rate changes I can then log against all market conditions. Thanks Mike

Aly just read back if we could get eveyone to do the same but don;t pay for bank statements

Re Allys rate changes

FHBR Sep 06 5%. Dec 06 5,5%. Feb 07 5.5%. Apr 07 6%. July 07 6%

Ok if we look at this tranch of rises Dec 06 looks justified but Feb 07 doesn't!! April Does but July doesn't!! The rate in July 07 was 6% but in Sep 07 it rose to 6.5% and Oct 07 to 7% but no rise for Ally!! Which is confusing!!

In 2008 it dropped from 6.5% to 6% in March which tallies it stayed at 6% until Last month when it was 6.5% so the Aug rise doesn't tally. If we look at it in broad terms when you started the loan the rate was 7.7% and the FHBR was 5%....Now it is 9.3% and the FHBR 6.5% which is about right

Re the anomolies, companies who use this rate generally fix the payment and seem to send out a balance either negative or positive from time to time. FP hasn't adopted this method and although there are times when the rise seems unjustified in Ally's case they didn't pass on the 2 consecutive rises in Sep and Oct 07. This is increasingly looking like a dead end [sorry] as it doesn't seem to tie in to either the BOE or LIBOR rate!!

Sean has mentioned that different people have had different rises at different times the only difficulty is in the wording of their [FP] contract as they do not use the FHBR rate alone!! At the moment I think that unless they have deviated wildly from customer to customer then there is not enough to take forward as a complaint!! The only other option is to actually work out the true cost re the FHBR and what has actually been paid but this may be negligable[?] on smaller loans !!

Any comments or views would be welcome! Mike

Hi, there is another FP customer on another forum who is taking the rate issue to OFT (I think?!), interesting to see his letter. On the Martin Lewis site under a thread for FP variable rates, not sure how specific I can be here with link! I have always had doubts as to how far we could go with this but will be interesting to see if the other person gets anywhere.

I am still going to persue PPI claim and first step is to get copies of all my paperwork and records of conversations. Again it seems claiming back single premium policies not as straight forward as others. My issue rests with my lack of understanding on the limited length of the cover and the front loading of interest which I will still be paying after the insurance finishes. I need to examine records of initial conversations about this to see what hoe in depth they may have/have not explained this to me.

I need to think it through carefully before claiming as will likely need to continue with the loan even if get PPI back. I don't want FP to use any clauses to penalise me at all or push my rate even higher. I will have all rate change info bac from them with the request for info on my account so will take a look at the track of my rate over the past 3 years, if anything interesting turns up I'll be back in touch. I guess this request will take some time though.

Hi Mike - thanks for the info on the rates - if you think we have no cause for complaint about the rates, maybe we have cause to complain about the way the loan was sold to us.

The initial application was done online but then we had a long conversation with one of their staff over the telephone about the loan details and to confirm everything. My husband had the conversation with them and he scribbled note as he was talking. I have just found the notes and have the name of the staff member as well as details of the initial monthly repayments. At no time in the conversation did they tell us the rates were variable and therefore subject to change. Stupidly, we didn't pick up on this in the agreement form and I accept that is our fault for not reading through it properly. However I feel that they deliberately left this matter out of the conversation to mislead us. We were shocked to get the first letter about the increasing interest in Dec 06 and only then did we read the agreement again and saw the word 'variable' .

My second gripe is the face that 'The Bank of England interest rate increase' is the only reason given for the increase in interest in their letters dated Dec 06 & Feb 07. They dont start to mention the FHBR until the letter dated April 07. Again, I think this is misleading customers and is the reason for so many customers now expecting a rate reduction.

If we take a complaint to the OFT - they may uphold the decision for FP to keep rates as high as they want, but maybe they will take them to task about misleading customers.

I also saw the post on Martin Lewis's website about the guy who is already complaining to the OFT about this and he pretty much raises the same points. If the OFT get another complaint is this likely to get more attention?

God my head is about to explode!

Aly

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On a crusade against Firstplus