The district court of Stuttgart announced a spectacular decision on Tuesday: the Volksbank in the small climatic health resort of Welzheim in the Rems-Murr district was allowed to threaten a customer with the termination of their checking account because they had reclaimed account management fees from the past (file number 34 O 98/21 KfH). .

A corresponding lawsuit by the consumer advice center was dismissed.

The case is likely to drag through other instances.

Christian Siedenbiedel

Editor in Business.

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There is a lot at stake: What initially sounds like a conflict of regional importance could well cause waves.

It is about how banks and bank customers deal with a judgment of the Federal Court of Justice from last April.

In it, the court had rejected as inadmissible the previous practice of many banks of interpreting customer silence as consent to changes in the general terms and conditions of current accounts, such as increases in fees (file number XI ZR 26/20).

Many bank customers are afraid of closing their accounts

Since then, bank customers everywhere in Germany have been demanding money back from their banks.

Thousands have hired lawyers and legal tech companies to do this, others are using a sample letter from Stiftung Warentest to demand their money back.

The consumer centers have already advised in countless cases.

It's kind of a massive battle between bank customers and banks.

At first there was even speculation that smaller banks could tip over.

But the banks have discovered a means of threatening how they want to persuade their customers to give up the money: They threaten to close their accounts.

Banks have already done this in individual cases, but in many more cases, including large banks, the threat is above all.

The mechanism works like this: The bank makes the customer an offer.

She names an account management fee at which she would be willing to keep the account if the customer waives the repayment of previous fees.

Unfortunately, if he declines the offer, she will have to fire him.

Unfortunately, there is no other offer.

Many bank customers are apparently worried about their current account: Switching accounts is so time-consuming and can lead to breakdowns.

That's why many don't want to risk it.

Many bank customers have contacted the FAZ to ask whether they can still claim their money back if the bank threatens to terminate the contract.

That is why it is so important whether it is legal for a bank to close the account in such cases.

This is how the bank's lawyer in Welzheim describes the case: The bank terminated the customer's account because the customer did not respond to the bank's offer to keep his account for 5 euros a month if he waived claims from the past received.

"The bank's offer provided that the cheap account price would be maintained, so everything would remain the same if the bank was allowed to keep the fees for the services it had provided in the past," says Ferdinand Scholl, the bank's lawyer .

The consumer didn't want that;

he only wanted to secure the bank's offer for the future, but there was no offer from the bank for that.

"An offer that doesn't exist can't be accepted," says Scholl.

The bank determines the offer, not the customer: "Since that's the case,