Kiwibank Joins ANZ/National in Bank Class Action

13 November 2013

Kiwibank Joins ANZ/National in Bank Class Action

Fair Play on Fees has today named Kiwibank as the next bank to face a class action over unfair penalty fees.

Kiwibank customers must register at www.fairplayonfees.co.nz by 11pm on Thursday, 21 November 2013 to ensure their inclusion in the case. Court documents will be lodged on Friday, 22 November.

“Today is a positive step for the campaign. We now have a sufficient number of Kiwibank customers to take their complaint to court and fight to get their unlawful penalty fees back. We expect thousands more Kiwibank customers to join the campaign as a result of today’s announcement and encourage them to do so before the court documents are filed.

“We also encourage customers of all the remaining banks who have been affected by penalty fees to sign up to the Fair Play on Fees action. Today is also an opportunity for customers of all banks to take a stand against these unlawful fees.”

The High Court recently made orders requiring all ANZ/National Bank customers who wish to join the case to do so by 13 December. Court documents relating to that case were filed in June 2013.

The launch of Fair Play on Fees has seen more than 35,000 Kiwis sign up to date, of which over 6,000 are Kiwibank customers.

The lead plaintiffs for the case are Auckland couple Leanne and Sydney Briggs. The Briggs’ banked with Kiwibank for six and a half years and in that time were hit with more than 100 default fees, totalling almost $2,000.

Leanne Briggs, a busy working Mum, says she was regularly charged despite having transferred money to her account the day before to cover an automatic payment. “Technically Kiwibank said I was still overdrawn because the money didn’t go in until the following day because the payment went out that same morning. The default fees happened so often and I couldn’t do anything about it, no matter how many times I called.”
She was once charged $10 plus interest for being 2 cents overdrawn on a mortgage payment for a few days. Eventually, Leanne switched banks.

Hooker says a common theme among the Kiwibank complainants is that they had joined the bank because they were frustrated with the way they were being treated by their Australian owned bank. “These customers were then bitterly disappointed to find they were treated no differently by joining a Kiwi owned bank,” Hooker says.

The complainants will argue that the payment of penalty fees charged by Kiwibank over the past six years significantly outweigh the cost of facilitating the transactions. The penalty fees include unarranged overdrafts (account out of order fees), rejected payments on deposit accounts (dishonour fees), late payment and exceeding a credit limit on credit cards.

The team behind the case is New Zealand lawyer Andrew Hooker, Australian class action experts Slater & Gordon and litigation funder Litigation Lending Services. The litigation is structured to ensure claimants have no upfront costs and nothing to lose by joining the action. All legal services are provided on a no win, no fee basis.

New Zealanders can join the action against unfair bank fees by registering at: www.fairplayonfees.co.nz.

END

© Scoop Media