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Half A Million Claimants Expected In Largest Ever Class Action Law Suit Against Australian Banks
Nearly 40,000 bank customers have signed up to what looks like Australia’s largest ever class action law suit, with the initiator of the legal action saying it believes it will register as many as half a million claimants in its law suit seeking reimbursement of “exorbitant” exception fees.
As of yesterday, Financial Redress launched as many as 12 class action suits against a number of banks for nearly $5 billion in fees levied over six years, the number of claimants was 38,378.
James Middleweek, who heads up Perth based subsidiary Financial Redress declined to specify exactly how many claimants had so far signed the funding agreement on the special purpose website.
Bernard Murphy, who is chairman of Melbourne based law firm Maurice Blackburn say that is would take as long as three to four weeks before the first writs could be filed.
“I expect it will be a strong fight (against the banks), but we are armed for the fight, we’re funded and ready to go.” Mr Murphy said at a press conference.
Fronting the claimants was Mr. Matthew Burgess, who says he was hit by as much as $1,000 in penalty fees by his bank Westpac over a two to three year period.
Mr. Burgess receives social security benefit on a fortnightly basis says the fees were incurred after his gym membership fees were deducted from an overdrawn account on a direct debit basis.
“I needed to attend the gym for health and medical reasons, and the fees impacted my ability to feed myself and keep my accommodation,” he said.
“Sometimes it was only a day or two before the account was replenished (with more funds). When I approached the bank, I was referred to my contract. I believe the bank was taking advantage of me. For me, it’s a social justice issue. It’s predatory behaviour by the banks and they need to be held accountable.”
Mr. Burgess added that he was unable to end his gym membership, and was effectively locked into a contract due to the punitive exit terms.
According to Financial Redress’s Mr. Murphy, the company had obtained advice from senior council over what it believes is a simple legal matter.
Mr. Murphy said that banks had the right to charge a reasonable amount for honour and dishonour fees on accounts that are overdrawn, and customers who exceed their credit limit, or make late payments on their credit cards.
“If it’s exorbitant, we win; if it’s not we close,” he said.
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4 Responses to “Half A Million Claimants Expected In Largest Ever Class Action Law Suit Against Australian Banks”
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I would like to register to claim back the exorbitant fees charged on my credir card. Where do I register?
http://www.financialredress.com.au/
please take a look at the financial redress website. You should be able to register on there.
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non ATM fees
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being charged non ATM fees