Project work and I have been chatting to the GDPR team within the bank for advice on a few elements.
They were stressed. Apparently there has been a significant uptick in the number of customers insisting on their right to be forgotten under GDPR.
They all seem to have forgotten that their loans are still outstanding! (We do not have to “forget” customers that have active loans or accounts”)
Muppets! Muppets everywhere!
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Nice try.
There must be some provisions that require you to keep records of customers for a period surely?
For the checking of interest paid or received for example, which HMRC might be interested in?
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I dont think right to be forgotten extends to your credit reference.
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>> I dont think right to be forgotten extends to your credit reference.
>>
It has not been tested in court, but according to my notes: "This is because the right to be forgotten is, re the ICO, not absolute and only applies in certain circumstances. Data held for credit referencing purposes is not part of these certain circumstances and is instead subject to strict industry guidelines around data processing and sharing."
If you were able to be forgotten, the lenders would just make any assumption that was legal, including that you have no information on which to bases a decision on and reject your application.
Anyway, we have lists of people with whom we refuse to deal with and funnily enough it is shared with many other lenders, who do the same and it is not computerised or written down in normal forms.
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>> Anyway, we have lists of people with whom we refuse to deal, and funnily
>> enough it is shared with many other lenders who do the same and it is
>> not computerised or written down in normal forms.
Marginally legal at best if some of the names are natural persons rather than entitities?
Sensible maybe.
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>> Sensible maybe.
Totally. These are people that deliberately set up businesses with the sole purpose to rip off banks and other financial institutions, long firm frauds etc.
Their names or their aliases pop up again and again and they become ever more sophisticated.
If we didn't have our lists, the banks would lose £millions to them.
Last edited by: VxFan on Wed 24 Jun 20 at 12:52
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>> Nice try.
>>
>> There must be some provisions that require you to keep records of customers for a
>> period surely?
>>
>> For the checking of interest paid or received for example, which HMRC might be interested
>> in?
>>
Exactly. We have legal requirements to keep certain records for a number of years, regardless of what the customer wants and we have no obligation to forget a customer under GDPR if they owe us money and retain the right to process their data as we require and the law requires!
There are apparently youtube videos and articles that list the individuals rights under GDPR and they discuss how to get away with not paying loans by asking to be forgotten.
Usually a letter of explanation asking for full repayment of a mortgage, loan or credit card balance settles it but sometimes you get customers going to the ICO with a complaint. They have all come down on our side, I would say obviously, but sometimes there can be weird decisions that you have to go back to them on.
Apparently some rejections are met with abuse and threats of violence at which point the police are always involved.
Last edited by: zippy on Tue 23 Jun 20 at 18:56
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Sound like 'Freemen of the Land', Dont pay for a TV licence and Belittle legitimate debt collector, police and authority baiting mouthy types that regularly post on Youtube.
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>>legitimate debt collectors...
Ever since one clamped my leased company car as an asset (a big bank's car) because it happened to be on a factory car park of a business that owed money I have no time for them and the idiotic coppers* that just took their word without checking.
*Not all by a long shot, but these two in Leeds took the biscuit. I was telling them the car had nothing to do with the company, the directors of the company were telling them that I was a visitor and the car wasn't theirs and whats more the lease company on the phone told them that they owned the car. The debt collectors told the cops that they had a right to anything on the property which was a total lie** and the cops believed them!
They were threatening to put my car on a low loader and take it away and I was 6 hours from home, so I sat in the car. Arrested for obstruction of a bailiff.
They just wouldn't listen and a lawyer from the Leeds office had to turn up at the nick to sort everything out pointing out that I couldn't legally obstruct a bailiff that was acting unlawfully.
Thank goodness for the very apologetic Super including biscuits or it would have been a claim for false arrest.
**not only because they didn't have rights to anything the company didn't own, but before the creditor's case went to court, I had put in place an all asset debenture including a fixed and floating charge over all assets meaning that everything was claimed by the bank anyway as a preferential creditor.
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I think you have recently mentioned that unfortunate interaction.I hope they were chocolate biscuits :)
There are also a considerable amount of lawful and legitimate Bailiff business where debtors are just taking everyone for a ride and playing the system. If you are the one they owe money to its far from funny.
Last edited by: Fullchat on Tue 23 Jun 20 at 21:48
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>> I think you have recently mentioned that unfortunate interaction.I hope they were chocolate biscuits :)
>>
>> There are also a considerable amount of lawful and legitimate Bailiff business where debtors are
>> just taking everyone for a ride and playing the system. If you are the one
>> they owe money to its far from funny.
>>
I appreciate that there are and we instruct some ourselves, but we always vet them thoroughly - there is a significant representational risk to us if they cock up and there are some extra rules we apply like no entering a home where there is a young family, no turfing people out of homes etc.
And yes, there are professional scrotes who try and take us and smaller businesses for loans all the time. Shame there are no debtors prisons (joke) but in cases where its deliberate loan or mortgage fraud, the CPS just don't want to know for the vast majority of cases.
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Criminal Protection Service
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>> there are some extra rules we apply like .................no turfing people out of homes etc.
You never evict anyone from a domestic property?
Remind me - for whom do you work?
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My experience from the valuation and estate agency side of this, is that most defaulters leave (trashing the house in the meantime) before the bailiffs arrive to take possession.
From a GDPR perspective, if I forgot all my clients details, then when they ring me 20 years after we valued a building, we could not help them in their tax reduction claim. Similarly, if they require an update valuation, if we have not kept the details. we cannot 'refresh our memories' from the file and do the job at a cheaper rate, but have to start from scratch at a full fee.
Be careful what you wish for....
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>> Remind me - for whom do you work?
Never. This is B2B banking. We have personal guarantees from customers and will take charging orders on properties so we get a share of the house when its naturally sold, but we wont force it and we wont take possession. It's not worth the reputational risk.
Last edited by: VxFan on Wed 24 Jun 20 at 12:54
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>> Never. This is B2B banking. We have personal guarantees from customers and will take charging
>> orders on properties so we get a share of the house when its naturally sold,
>> but we wont force it and we wont take possession. It's not worth the reputational
>> risk.
That all makes sense. So the money is, um, already in the bank, so to speak.
Watching the "Can't Pay, We'll Take it Away" and "The Sheriffs are Coming" type of TV programme, I often wonder what sort of credit references and checks are carried out on the tenants before granting them a tenancy.
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>> Watching the "Can't Pay, We'll Take it Away" and "The Sheriffs are Coming" type of
>> TV programme, I often wonder what sort of credit references and checks are carried out
>> on the tenants before granting them a tenancy.
>>
We have had trouble with that type of outfit. If the debt collector does something wrong then the creditor - the person who employed them - can be sued, which is why I mentioned that we are very careful with the ones we use and vet them.
The police don't help - it's not their fault - they haven't been trained properly.
We had a case where someone owed some money for electricity. The utility company owed the bank and went bust and so we took the collections activity as the liquidators didn't want to know - big mistake!!!
Bailiff turns up puts foot in door. Debtor calls the police. Police turn up and are told that debtor is blocking access. Need to say debtor was disabled - not a skiver - we should have never gone near this!!!
Bailiff claims debtor is obstructing him.
Police arrest on public order and let bailiff in.
Problem is that the bailiff had no right to enter - they don't for utility bills and you can't obstruct a bailiff that has no right of entry.
So the tenant sues the police for false arrest - which he is successful for because you can't commit public order offences in your own house. He also sues the police for letting the bailiff in the property. (Both settled out of court.)
He sued the bailiffs for aggravated trespass and lost property and won.
He sued us for employing the incompetent bailiff and won (settled out of court) - which is why we are very reluctant / use very competent firms now.
He effectively won enough to pay his utility bills for the rest of his life!
Last edited by: zippy on Wed 24 Jun 20 at 12:59
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>>He effectively won enough to pay his utility bills for the rest of his life!
I'm a bit surprised that you settled for a cup of tea and some biscuits then.
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>> >>He effectively won enough to pay his utility bills for the rest of his life!
>>
>> I'm a bit surprised that you settled for a cup of tea and some biscuits
>> then.
>>
One thing you learn in life is to chose your battles. My run-in with was in 1992 and the case above was 2014. No-win-no-fee lawyers were not as common then.
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You're not wrong.
1992 feels like it ought to be so recent. But according to my children it's ancient history.
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>> there are some extra rules we apply like .................no turfing people out of homes etc.
>>You never evict anyone from a domestic property?
>>Remind me - for whom do you work?
>>Never. This is B2B banking.
So if you are in B2B banking, no turfing people out of homes wasn't exactly the most benevolent and impactful promise you could make, was it.
And if an individual is ultimately responsible for the debt, then I do not believe that your company will not force the sale of that house. That would be irresponsible business management for which your directors would be punished.
Perhaps you mean that they don't do it directly?
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>> And if an individual is ultimately responsible for the debt, then I do not believe
>> that your company will not force the sale of that house. That would be irresponsible
>> business management for which your directors would be punished.
>>
>> Perhaps you mean that they don't do it directly?
>>
The rationale behind a personal guarantee against a business loan is to focus the minds of the company directors and to get the directors' help in selling the business or to help the administration / liquidation process and stop them just walking away. Categorically is not intended to be a guarantee for the repayment of the loan in full.
That would be a different business proposition and a different banking market which we are not involved in (2nd tier lenders play in that area).
Personal guarantees are not for the full amount of the loan and it is not unusual to take a £10k or £20k guarantee for a £250k loan or a £50k guarantee for a £1m loan. There are very few p.g.s above £50k. Often we don't even take p.g.s. or they are not available.
Our business model is to rely on the business to make repayment and loans are secured on assets via all asset debentures and fixed and floating charges. The problem we encounter is that the assets are worth a lot less in a "fire sale". We would never lend if it we would need to rely on a PG for repayment as final guarantor. If this were the case then in reality we wouldn't be writing that loan.
For example, if we make a loan to a printing business and it unfortunately failed, the directors would be ideally placed to help us / the liquidators finish of outstanding jobs, negotiate partly completed contracts, find paperwork to support the sale of plant and machinery if necessary. The PG helps us get the help we need before the directors minds are focused on setting up their next venture.
There have been numerous business failures but very few actual bad debts because of the help we have received from the directors of those businesses. Those that there have been were spectacular (smallest £20m, largest £500m) and p.g.s would not have made any material difference but did focus the directors to help identify the areas that we needed to concentrate on to maximise recovery and in those instances the P.G.s were released in return for the help given.
We call the P.g. in if there is an absolute failure to assist and we have never forced a sale of a family home. We have forced the sale of second homes. The negative press of big high street bank forcing a family out over a £50k guarantee would not be good. As I mentioned before, we do get charging orders. We do not sell that charging order on. We sit and wait.
This has been the policy since I have been at this bank and was the same at the previous B2B banks that I worked at across 3 decades.
As to the directors being punished etc., banking has changed significantly over recent years and policies like this with a full explanation as to why they exist and how to follow them are fully documented and signed off at numerous levels within the organisation with staff having particular discretionary limits and basically fit within the bad debt policy for the product i.e. if we lend then we will experience a level of bad debt. We can be criticised for not having enough bad debts as well as having to many - it's all about RoA (not racehorse owners association - though my director may think otherwise sometimes).
I'm not letting you know what my discretionary limit is, you might ask for a loan! ;-)
Last edited by: zippy on Wed 24 Jun 20 at 20:42
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I might if I knew what a B2B Bank was? :S
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B2B = Business to Business.
Two businesses dealing with each other as opposed to B2C which is Business to Consumer - retail, if you prefer.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Wed 24 Jun 20 at 23:06
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I'm obliged. Everyday is a school day :)
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Then there's C2B which is taking your Christmas presents back to Marks & Spencer.
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GDPR The Right to be forgotten - Manatee
