OCU supports the EU call for banks to pay back everything charged under floor clauses

Madrid, 27 October 2015. The European Commission report is a clear boost for a full refund of the money overcharged to those affected by the floor clause. OCU has always maintained that the Supreme Court ruling, which ordered refunds only from May 2013, was clearly insufficient: if a clause is declared invalid, it must have been invalid from the start.

The next step will be the ruling of the European Union Court of Justice. OCU is confident that the criterion will be the same so the millions of people affected by this clearly unfair clause can recover their money.

 Since most of the contracts do not comply with the requirements for transparency, virtually all

consumers are entitled to eliminate these clauses from their contracts, stop them being applied and recover the unduly paid amount.

OCU warns consumers to take extreme care when signing
agreements with banks; in many cases, they offer to remove the floor clause, without retroactive effect, in exchange for a waiver regarding legal action. Clearly,
the banks are taking advantage of the straitened circumstances of many families to propose deals which go against the interests of their clients.

 Currently, more than one thousand people affected by the floor clause have entrusted OCU to initiate legal action against this abuse; and this number is increasing. Numerous decisions have ruled in favour of the families, victims of these unfair terms. OCU reminds everyone that we have a calculator available to consumers where they can find the total cost incurred by including the floor clause on their mortgages.

OCU points out that, given the current levels of the Euribor, the removal of the floor clause means many customers are saving over 100 euros per month. To this should be
added the amounts overpaid, that in most cases exceed 6,000
euros.

 OCU is making all relevant information available on its website http://www.ocu.org/  so people can find out for free about all aspects related to this topic.

For more information (media) Eva Jimenez Tel. 917 226 061 prensa@ocu.org