**BEWARE** R5 000 interest & fees charged on inactive account!!

Standard Bank has charged me approximately R5 000 in "overdraft service fees", "monthly management fees" and "excess interest" on a student achiever account I used while I was still in varsity. I have not used this account since 2019 and had in all honestly forgotten about it. I do not bank with Standard Bank and simply had this account during my varsity days.

I never received a statement from Standard Bank unit last month when I suddenly received an email with a statement. The statement reflected a balance owing. I was surprised and confused as I had not seen anything relating to this account in years.

I tried for a period of 2 weeks to get hold of someone via the call centre but no one ever answers the call. Today I got hold of a person who advised me that all she could tell me was that an amount was owing due to interest and fees. I needed to pay an amount of R15 in order for her to provide me with the full outstanding balance.

I need to pay Standard Bank R15 so that I can find out what I allegedly owe them so that they can stop charging me interest and fees. I find this outrageous. I do not have access to internet banking as I do not bank with Standard Bank. My details are no longer the same given the period of time that has lapse and so I could not even access this account if I wanted to.

I also find it outrageous and extremely concerning that Standard Bank would just continue to let the account run up the interest and fees with no end in sight. At what stage would Standard Bank close the account and start collecting the fees? Keep in mind that this is supposedly a student account. Although I am no longer a student, would any reasonable student be able to pay R5 000 in interest and fees? Is there no obligation on Standard Bank in these circumstances to close the account and stop incurring further fees? As a young student I did not understand the consequence of not actively closing the account (this is also not something which Standard Bank explained to me). However, Standard Bank does understand these consequences and as a financial institution must have an obligation to protect its customers from becoming unnecessarily over indebted as a result of interest and fees on patently inactive accounts.

For the avoidance of doubt, this is a principled matter. I am incredibly disappointed and appalled by such conduct which I will be reporting to the OBS/NFO.