The Commerzbank should not have charged its customers negative interest rates. According to a ruling by the Frankfurt Regional Court, the relevant clauses are inadmissible (Ref. 2-25 O 228/21).
The prolonged low interest rate environment led many banks and savings banks to charge their customers so-called custody fees. Whether such negative interest rates are permitted under banking law is legally disputed. The Frankfurt Regional Court has now sided with consumers with a ruling dated November 18, 2022, deciding that Commerzbank wrongly charged negative interest, explains the business law firm MTR Rechtsanwälte, which specializes in banking law.
A whole series of banks and savings banks in the past have begun to charge negative interest. This affected both call money and current accounts, as well as savings deposits. Now that the European Central Bank has raised the key interest rate, the issue of negative interest rates seems to be resolved. However, it remains that customers were improperly charged – as the Frankfurt Regional Court found.
Commerzbank had imposed so-called credit fees on savings deposits of new customers starting from 50,000 euros. The Hamburg Consumer Center filed a lawsuit against this practice, deeming it unlawful. The Frankfurt Regional Court shared this view. It decided that the relevant clauses regarding custody fees are inadmissible because they unfairly disadvantage customers. Charging negative interest contradicted the statutory model of savings deposits, the court found. It is intended that customers entrust their money to the bank and receive interest in return, not the other way around. By levying custody fees, the bank improperly passes operational costs onto the customers, the Frankfurt Regional Court explained.
Moreover, the clauses also violated the transparency requirement, as they were “hidden” in a footnote and not offered to the customer as a separate deposit model, allowing them to decide. The clauses are therefore inadmissible and Commerzbank wrongly imposed negative interest rates.
Similarly to the Frankfurt Regional Court, the Berlin and Düsseldorf Regional Courts have also ruled. According to the case law, customers have a good chance of reclaiming wrongly charged negative interest rates from banks.
Lawyers experienced in banking law can advise you on your options.
