Is competition law the way forward for consumers? asks Veronica Bailey
The banks may have rejoiced at the Supreme Court decision in The Office of Fair Trading v Abbey National plc & others [2009] EWCA Civ 116, [2009] All ER (D) 270 (Feb) that the OFT does not have power under the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contract Regulations 1999 (SI 2009/2083) (UTCCR) to assess the fairness of the banks charging terms, but this is unlikely to be the final chapter of this saga.
The banks’ appeal to the Supreme Court was confined to the narrow issue of deciding whether the OFT had power under the UTCCR to investigate whether the system of charging personal current account holders was fair. The unauthorised overdraft charges were part of the “price or remuneration” for the services and as such fell within the exemption of reg 6(2)(b) and could not be challenged by the OFT for fairness, the Supreme Court held.
In what has been described as a “reverse Robin Hood” approach, unauthorised overdraft or insufficient funds charges are largely incurred by low income and low saving consumers
