Setting Off

I was reading today in the paper about comething called setting off. This allows banks to legal take money from different accounts that you have with them to pay off a debt. It is causing real problems for some people in hardship who put money aside to pay important bills to find that the bank has helped themselves to it leaving them short.

I guess this provides a good argument for spreading your money around lots of different financial institutions.

Read more: Banks exploiting obscure law to raid accounts and recover debts | Money | The Observer

A sharp rise in secret raids by banks on savings and current accounts of customers who owe them money is forcing hundreds of recession-hit households deeper into financial hardship. But the banks are doing nothing illegal: hidden rules allow them to "set off" a customer's debt against cash held by that person at the same institution.

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