£500 charge for 8p overdraft

21 July 2008 04:13pm

A student has accused a bank of being "irresponsible" after it charged her more than £500 for going 8p overdrawn.

Laura Gibson has now been threatened with legal action if she does not pay the charges she says she just cannot afford.

The 20-year-old said Lloyds TSB charged daily fees of up to £20 and a monthly fee of £15 for having an unplanned overdraft in January.

Miss Gibson, who is enrolled on a course at Gloucestershire College to start this September, did not notice the charges at first, and by the time she was aware of the debt it had spiralled beyond her control.

Miss Gibson, who lives in Monkscroft, in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, suffered a nervous breakdown in November 2007 and claims the stress has contributed to her illness.

She said: "On top of this (the debt) they have been harassing me by telephone and by mail, putting pressure on me to pay this money back. I suffered a nervous breakdown in November which was partly due to financial stress and this constant harassment has only made me worse.

"I feel that it is morally irresponsible that the bank can charge people such ridiculous amounts of money especially when some of their charges amount to more than my income each week.

"There is no possibility of people paying this back but they still accumulate daily charges driving people further and further into debt."

Miss Gibson said the bank initially charged £20 a week for being overdrawn, but when her debts topped £100, the bank started charging £20 a day. Her latest bank statement shows she was £180.97 overdrawn on May 1 but by July 1 it had increased to £515.38.

Miss Gibson said she intends to claim the money back and has had to pay a £10 fee to request a full list of the charges and copies of statements.

© The Press Association