Question Time: Am I due car finance payback? 9-year-old learns about interest! If my bank overpays me, can I keep it?

0:00This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK.

0:30the highest B2B return on ad spend of major ad networks. Spend$250 on your first campaign on LinkedIn ads and get$250 credit for the next one. Just go to linkedin.com slash broadcast. That's linkedin.com slash broadcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hi, this is Alex Kantrowicz. I'm the host of Big Technology Podcast, a longtime reporter and an on-air contributor to CNBC. And if you're like me, you're trying to figure out how artificial is changing the business world and our lives. So each week on Big Technology, I bring on key actors from companies building AI tech and outsiders trying to influence it, asking where this is all going.

1:07They come from places like NVIDIA, Microsoft, Amazon, and plenty more. So if you want to be smart with your wallet, your career choices, in meetings with your colleagues and at dinner parties, listen to Big Technology Podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

1:24Martin Lewis:The name's Bond. Bank and Building Society Bond. Licence to save. We're going to hear exactly how it works sometime this month. The following day there was a penny, which seems so insignificant to this little person. It was a free penny. Do I just leave it as it is or are they going to come clawing the money back in a few months' time? Hello and welcome to the cunningly named The Martin Lewis Podcast. I do wonder what that's going to be about. This is our question time episode where you get to ask me your questions on absolutely anything and everything. Open brackets within reason, close brackets.

1:56Martin Lewis:In this week's pod, you ask me, is my car finance agreement covered by the misselling redress scheme? Can my partner and I couple up to ramp cashback offers? I've told Monzo it's overpaid me. It's done nothing. Do I get to keep the money? What can I do about a retailer that keeps displaying the wrong returns info online? And we've got a lovely success story involving a nine-year-old doing jobs for money and a bit of singing too. Not from me, don't worry. Play the theme tune.

2:39Martin Lewis:Welcome to our Question Time edition of the podcast where you can ask me anything and everything you like. Here's the brackets within reason, close brackets. And of course, joining me and putting the whole thing together is the one, the only, the curator of questions, Professor Sir Matthew Burnham Esquire. Boop, boop, boop. I'll do it for myself. You didn't notice. You missed out Doctor. I did miss out Doctor. Oh, I noticed straight away. Okay, do you know why I missed out Doctor? Go on. What did you forget to bring to the studio that's causing you more difficulties in your production? I knew you'd mention this.

3:16Martin Lewis:So I left my laptop at home. And you've been fiddling around and been a little bit not quite sure where you're going because of that. Yeah, it just throws you off. A little bit less efficient. So I'm afraid I didn't feel you could have your doctor in your title. My honorary doctorate has been revoked. You've kept your honorary professorship. You've kept your honorary knighthood and your honorary esquireness. And just to clarify for everyone listening, they are all honorary. None of them are real titles. No, I wish they were. They are titles within the canon of this podcast. That's quite a good way to phrase it.

3:50Yeah, it is. Quite a nerdy way to phrase it.

3:52Martin Lewis:Well, it's also within the canon of this podcast, a nerdy way to phrase it. Now, I know what many listeners will be waiting here is for any updates on the suggested name for people who are contacted and either get read out or call up the show. Have we had any suggestions in? Loads. Yes. Loads. Okay, give me them, give me them. I'm going to give you my instant reaction. I promise I haven't heard any of these before. I'm going to do this live on air. Or should, no, I tell you what, we're a proper podcaster who's meant to be doing serious stuff. We're going to save this till the end. Are you sure?

4:24Do you want one now? All right, one. One, okay. So we've got Kiara. She says, Savvy Sally's. Ooh. She's also given a few others. Budget Conscious Questioners.

4:36Martin Lewis:BCQ. BCQ. The brilliant budget conscious BBCs. Yeah, no, not doing BBCs. No, spreadsheeters. I like spreadsheeters. Put that one on the spreadsheet. Okay, or inquisitive money-saving experts. I don't think we can use that one. No, we can't. There's trademark issues and all types of compliance cross-promotional issues that go on with that. Go back to the first. Savvy Sally is very interesting. Savvy Sally. I'll tell you why Savvy Sally is very interesting because, again, regular listeners, and we're going very niche, will know about Rosie, who works for me on the podcast. Well, Rosie is here this week, but because Rosie isn't going to be here next week, the wonderful Sally is going to be filling in for Rosie.

5:13Martin Lewis:And Sally is actually in the studio with me, and you've just suggested Savvy Sally, which does put it quite high up the list. Yeah, so we've got our own Sally. Give me another shake whether you think it should be Savvy Sally. Sally is supporting Savvy Sally, but she's biased, so I'm not sure I'm going to take any notice of that, frankly. So, right, we're going to do the rest of those at the end of the pod. Shall we start with a proper question? Let's do a proper one. OK. Matt, what's your first question for me? And who's it from? This one is from Margaret. She's emailed it in. MartinLewsPodcast at bbc.co.uk.

5:43She says, hello. Hello. No, no, Martin or Matt. Just hello. That's fine.

5:47Martin Lewis:She says hello. It's polite. Hello, Margaret. I have had several new Ford cars over a number of years and have always used Ford Finance on a fixed term contract, which gives me the choice of changing my car to another new Ford car during or at the end of the agreed term. keeping my car or giving it back. Does this type of contract using Ford Credit fall into the car finance redress scheme? Probably is my answer. It sounds to me like it's Ford Options, which is a sort of PCP or HP agreement depending on how they've worked it. And the two types of agreement that are covered under car finance redress are personal contract payments and higher purchase, PCP and HP.

6:27Martin Lewis:So if it's what I think it is, and obviously I can't go any further than if it's what I think it is. To my ears, it sounds like it should be covered. And let's remember there are up to 14 million agreements that are likely due a typical£700 car finance payout. And we are going to hear the regulators' redress scheme. We're going to hear exactly how it works sometime this month, sometime in March. Now, when they say we will do this in March, it could last until Tuesday the 31st. I mean, they could be doing this at five o 'clock on Tuesday the 31st. I wouldn't be surprised or maybe the Monday before unlikely this Friday, but possible this Friday.

7:10Martin Lewis:That's how these things tend to work. So what's this all about? Well, this is the fact that in three different ways, people, the regulator believes people may have been missold car finance. Those three different ways in a nutshell. The big one is what's called discretionary commission arrangements, DCAs. that's where the interest you paid was increased to pay the dealer or broker an extra commission. Now, they were banned on the 28th of January 2021. So that is only for agreements before that. The other two types can be for agreements after that, which is contractual ties, basically where a broker didn't tell you it was working primarily with one lender.

7:47Martin Lewis:So an example would be, yeah, we're going to put this to a panel of lenders, but then only went to one lender. That lender wanted your business. So they only told you about that lender's business. and the other one is literally based on the rates of the commission. If the commission was above a certain level, it's deemed as unfairly high. Now, the most important thing you need to understand in all this and the counter logical thing and the thing that confuses people is there is no way to know if you were missold without complaining. So to know if you have a complaint, you have to complain. Which is, I don't know, I can't tell you because, you know, this is probably 40, 45 % of car finance agreements.

8:28Martin Lewis:But the whole point is it wasn't disclosed. You just don't know. So you have to put in a complaint and you can do that free. There are free tools online that will do this for you. You don't need to be going paying anybody to do it if you're going to go through the regulator's redress scheme. If you wanted to go to court, you'd probably want to pay somebody. And therefore you can do it yourself. So let's just go through the are you likely impacted checklist. This is for motor vehicle finance. So that's cars, vans, motorbikes, camper vans, but not caravans because they don't have a motor. The eligible date is any finance agreement from the 6th of April 2007 until the 1st of November 2024 is the last date.

9:05Martin Lewis:But I need to be honest, you are far more likely to have been missold if it wasn't in the last few years because they were improving their behaviours in those last few years. Although you could have been, but it is less likely. The finance types, as I've already mentioned, are PCP and HP. If you leased a car, that is not covered in this. Now, this is primarily for vehicles for personal use, although if you're a sole trader or a small partnership there and you got it for work, it could be covered if the finance is under 25 grand. if you've paid the vehicle off or you no longer own the vehicle irrelevant you could still have a claim this was about the finance agreement you took being missold to you whether you still have the car or not whether you still have the agreement or not is irrelevant if you were missold you were missold and if the owner has passed away then the primary beneficiary of the estate or the executor of the estate can claim on their behalf and if you had multiple eligible car finance deals deals with the same firm, you can claim.

10:04Martin Lewis:If you had multiple eligible car finance deals with different firms, you can claim, but then each one would need to be a separate complaint because you're going to different firms. And the reason you want to get the complaint in, and I've done lots about this and I will be doing more when the announcement comes out, the reason I'd suggest you complain is this. While under this mass redress scheme from the regulator, firms will be tasked with trying to find everybody who had car finance and was missold and getting in touch with them. It is going to be far quicker to get your payout if you've complained.

10:36Martin Lewis:They will definitely know your address and be able to track you if you've complained, as opposed to if they're trying to track you and you've moved house and they can't contact you. And also, they may not have details of old finance agreements, but you may have those details and therefore it's best to complain and get that in touch. And there is a new tool on the Equifax app. It should always be free if you're paying, you haven't set it up right, which can try and find old car finance agreements. back to 2007 for you. So hopefully that gives you a start. There are some great guides online where you can go through this in detail and free tools available, but that who is eligible.

11:07Martin Lewis:I turn what was a relatively short question into a very long answer there. Yes, you did. Maybe I was trying to broaden it for everybody listening. Hopefully it makes sense. And we'll know way more detail within weeks. And then this is all going to start. And it's for those who've complained, you will hopefully get your payout within 2026. If you haven't complained, unlikely in 2026, probably sometime in 2027 if they're trying to find you. So, Matt, we move from car finance into a caller, I am guessing. Who do you have for me? Into a caller with a success. Julie in Cheshire. Hi, Julie. Hi, Matt.

11:48Martin Lewis:Hello, Julie. Hi, Matt. Whereabouts in Cheshire? As a Cheshire man, whereabouts are you? Which part? I'm in Fredsham. oh oh now that we're already doing very well i know frodham very well well when i was growing up frodham was a village i think it's a town now but it is we're a market town it used to have the widest village street i think was the widest village street in in the uk uh because i grew up about six seven miles away from frodham which is not very far when you live in that part of the world i was in delamere forest so i was very near you yeah very near yeah we've been up to delamere a number of times it's beautiful right so it's lovely to have you on what what did we do what's the success well um i thought i would tell you about my my success with my little girl um and changing the way we look at money i suppose um so i i grew up in quite a deprived household so money was a big issue for us um and i was explaining to matt some of your stories um hit home quite hard for me it means I've got a bit of a difficult relationship with money and I still check pounds per pence when I you know go and put butter up in the in the market and I don't need to do that anymore so it was quite important.

13:06Martin Lewis:I think that's not a bad relationship with money I still do it too and I don't need to do it either I think there's something there's something about keeping your wits about you there's a difference between you can afford it and you don't want to be ripped tough yeah that yeah i think that's fair i i think i find it a little bit controlling i suppose but i don't want my children to have that opinion um and but in the same respect they're growing up in a very different world to me so i don't want them to think that money's no issue either which is easy done when uh when you know everything kind of gets paid for you so um we we've always given the children a bit of spends if they do the part so if they're helping out but it's always been a bit haphazard.

13:48So this year, we decided to give our nine-year-old some chores and said to her, right, if you do all your chores each day, you can earn a pound. If you've completed all of your chores all week, we will up that to£10, so we'll give you the extra£3, but you've got to do them every day consistently. So she's like, okay, well, you know, not really understanding money properly, I suppose, so we'll give this a go. By the Sunday, and we made a sit-up, top a cha-cha and so on it's like right well there's your seven pounds and actually you'll get this three pound for free basically just for doing your job bit like a brucey bonus i suppose

14:27Martin Lewis:bonus for good work yeah it's a performance related bonus i love it direct correct yeah so um so this went on for a couple of weeks but she listens to your podcast in the car with me all the time um it is quite fun what's her name a lot of the topics neve neve um hello yeah Oh my God, she will explode. So she listens to the podcast and obviously a lot of the topics go overhead, but we were listening to one on interest specifically. And she was like, what is interest? I was like, how do I even begin to explain this? Fascinating question from parents. What did you say? I want to know. So what I said to her is it's money that the bank gives to you because you're letting them look after your money.

15:16It's quite a difficult one. And the money that they give you depends on how much money you have in your bank at any one time. She's like, well, I don't. She has got a bank. But as far as she's concerned, she's like, well, I don't have a bank. My money augurs in my pot. I've got a pot full of pennies that adds up. So what we'll do, we'll open you a bank. So I've been listening to the podcast about all the different children, savers and so on. And we do have an ISA for her. We've got an ISA for both of us.

15:43Martin Lewis:Can I just tell you, I have such a big smile on my face. Please carry on. So we've got another daughter, my eldest daughter, Robin. She works and she's got her own bank and she deals with her own money now. But we said to her, look, we'll open you a bank. So we opened a Revolut account, which has a reasonable interest savings account attaching to it as well. It's about 3%, isn't it? Yeah, 3%, yeah. but they pay their interest daily. Nice. So we put in some birthday money that she'd had, put all the pennies together and cashed them all up, and I took the pennies and gave her the cash, and I've got to deal with the pennies, the bag full of pennies.

16:25Martin Lewis:Oh, someone in the supermarket's going to love you. Oh, I know, I know. I'm not sure I'm going to love it, but anyway. So we put all the money into her bank, and there was just short of a couple of hundred pounds once we'd totted it all up and put it all in for her. and she's like well what happens now when do I get this interest and I'm like well it doesn't quite happen immediately but let's you know see over the next couple of days so there's an app that comes with a Revolut account and when we logged in the following day there was a penny one penny which seems so insignificant to grown-ups but to this little person it was a free penny a penny that she didn't have yesterday and not given by mummy and daddy and given by the bank given by someone else yeah she earned it So, yeah, so by the following week, she tipped over and she got two pieces.

17:14It was like a revelation. But now it's just going to sit there making her extra money and she doesn't have to wash any pots for it.

17:23Martin Lewis:That's brilliant. And let me give Niamh a couple of tips from me. I'll tell you how I would describe interest. I would say interest is the price of money, which sounds very strange. But this is what happens. When you save in a bank or a savings account, you're actually giving them your money and you're allowing them to use it as they want to use it while they're holding on to it. And they can use it to make money. They can use it to lend to people. They can use it to invest in companies and all of those things make them money. But they're making money on your money. So they have to pay you because that you are allowing them to use your money while they look after it for you.

18:08Martin Lewis:That's where the interest comes from. That's the price that they have to pay to use your money. And interestingly, there's another thing we talk about that's called debt. And that's where you owe someone money, which is almost exactly the same thing, just the other way around. That's where you go to your bank and you say to them, I need some money to buy something. Can you give it to me? Can you lend it to me? And when they lend it to you, they then charge you because you get to use their money. But here's the difference. Normally, when we give our money to the bank, they give us three or four percent.

18:48Martin Lewis:And I'll leave your mummy and daddy to talk about percents to you. but when the bank gives us money it will charge us 18 or 19 percent so you are always far better to save up for something that you want rather than to have to borrow it in advance and you won't be able to borrow now you're way too young but this is a good thing to learn when you're older and one thing you could practice now is instead of when you have your money and you're doing brilliantly putting it all in the bank i think it's absolutely fantastic but when you have your money in the bank you always have two choices you can buy lots of little things with it but then it doesn't grow or you could have an idea of a big thing you want to get later something that'll be really exciting and you keep it in there and you have your money and you have the money given to you by the bank and then you get to have the big thing quicker i think neve sounds like you're doing absolutely brilliantly well done and thank you for listening to the podcast you are probably our youngest regular listener sorry i was talking to your daughter not to you there no no she loves it she absolutely loves it um and she loves the same tune she sings the same tune for us as well Does she?

19:48Martin Lewis:Can we hear her sing the theme tune? I got food. Oh, you got it. I got to pay. So I go work, work, work every day. I got mouths. I got mouths. I got to feed. So I'm going to make sure everybody eats. Oh. That was fantastic. I didn't know you had it. That's wonderful. Matt, was that you playing it in? How did that just work? It's magic. It's the magic of the podcast. Okay, that's two producer points for you there, Matt. Thank you very much. Oh, Julie, thank you so much for calling. What a lovely feel-good way, just in the run-up to Easter. That's absolutely wonderful. Thank you so much. And please send my best wishes to your brilliant daughter.

20:30Martin Lewis:Daughters. I will do. Thank you so much for your time. I do appreciate it. That's a pleasure. Thank you for calling. We love that story. Thanks for everything you do. But we're going to have to put it out as a challenge now. Do we have any younger regular listeners than nine? We would love to know. Do get in touch. Martin Lewis, podcast at bbc.co.uk. Thanks, Julie. Thanks, guys. Bye. Now, just one quick note on that. A lot of that whole idea about giving pocket money of pay is something I've talked about before because financial education is a big thing. And obviously, as adults, we have to go out to work mainly in order to get money.

21:02Martin Lewis:And I think the idea of pocket money of pay enables children to start to understand that sense and gives them a sense of the value of money. You know, if I've spent half an hour to get this pound, half an hour doing whatever it is, tidying up the kitchen table, whatever you've chosen them to do, That starts to breed that understanding of the value of money much more quickly and getting it as a concept. And I think it works well. The really big question, and I'll leave it up to you, is do you reward them for doing things that they're supposed to do anyway, such as tidying your bedroom? Do you get paid for tidying your bedroom?

21:33Martin Lewis:Or is that your own responsibility? The choice is up to you as parents. It's an interesting one, though. Matt, I don't know if we can top that, so let's just do a question. OK, a good one, though. Honestly, it was so good. A good one from Ben in Manchester. Martin. Buenas tardes, he starts. Buenas tardes. Martin and COQ Matt. Got it, right? Curator of questions. Curator of questions. Yes, not the other thing. I have a question for the part I was hoping you could answer. I've just signed up for the Lloyd's Ultra credit card to get the 1 % cash back for the first year. And there's an option to add a second card holder.

22:12If I add my partner as a card holder to my account, Would they be able to set up their own Lloyd's Ultra credit card in a year's time and add me as a card holder to their account? I basically want to maximise the 1 % cash back on my card this year and then next year we can have another 1 % cash back on their account. Would that be a legit way to maximise the 1 % cash back for two years on two different cards? Thanks for your help over the years. I made over£1 ,000 last year switching banks with a burner account, which will be a nice bonus towards our Spanish wedding later this year.

22:45Martin Lewis:Oh, well, first of all, congratulations on your wedding to come, Ben, and to your fiancé. How brilliant for the two of you. OK, so, yes, theoretically, absolutely the right thing to do. If you are in a trusting relationship, and that's very important, and clearly you're about to get married, so you're in a good place. I hate to be the one to say it, but not all relationships always work through financially in the right way for people. so it is something once you start to link your finances you need to take that as a very clear decision that you're both understanding because especially with a credit card there's no such thing as a joint credit card your your your partner would be the second card holder everything spent on that card is legally your debt not their debt there is no and i've been asked this question you know i'm not saying it's going to happen to you at all you've got a marriage coming up it's all going to be wonderful but let's we have to do this properly I've been asked the question many times you know my partner's just spent this on or my ex-partner spent this on the second credit card it's their debt do I have to pay it yes it's your debt that's the law that's how it works so you need to be very aware of that with those caveats done let's assume everything I hope is all rosy wonderful and you're both happy with it at which point absolutely when you have a limited period offer on a credit card like a 1 % cashback or similar, you've got the Amex Everyday card, which is similar.

24:09Martin Lewis:There you get 5 % cashback for the first five months. It's currently boosted up to that. It's tiered rates afterwards. It's only for higher spenders because you've got to spend, I think it's a minimum£3 ,000 on the card in order to get any form of cashback on it, but that's the whole point. One of you getting it, putting the other as a second card holder to use up that time period. And then when it ends, the other one of you getting it and swapping it the other way around, has long been a strategy I've advocated. The only issue with the Lloyds card is, of course, there is a chance that in a year's time, they may no longer have that offer.