Most customers of banks and savings banks in the Bonn, Rhein-Sieg and Ahrweiler region have signed the General Terms and Conditions (AGB) sent to them in recent months without further ado. However, a small number of customers have not yet given their consent. That is why the first banks in the region are now beginning to cancel customers' contracts.

This is what VR-Bank Rhein-Sieg is doing. Early on, the Siegburg-based institution, which is in the process of merging with VR-Bank Bonn, achieved an approval rate of 99 percent. "For customers who have not shown any reaction for a year - despite the bank contacting them several times - the termination process has begun," says spokeswoman Andrea Schrahe. For a "very small" number of customers who have rejected prices and services, the business relationship has already ended.

Volksbank Rhein-Ahr-Eifel has reached a similarly high approval rate. Michael Nisius, head of sales management, puts it at 99.8 percent of customers. At the beginning of May, the Volksbank had given notice to 55 customers, after the customers in question had been asked several times in writing for consent in the past nine months and offers of talks had come to nothing. "However, the majority of these customers are secondary bank accounts and inactive accounts," Nisius said. At the bank, the consent process has already started again: Currently, the bank was obtaining approval for the current GTC - this process should be completed by the end of the year.

The Kreissparkasse Ahrweiler has also achieved a similarly high approval rate of 98.2 percent, explains spokesperson Sven Schmitz. Contact via personal conversations in one of the branches, on the phone, by letter or on the internet continues. "We continue to try to establish a valid contractual basis with the few remaining customers after the above-mentioned ruling via these different channels, once again because we want to maintain long-term customer relationships and avoid a termination of a contractual relationship at all costs," says Schmitz.

But in the case of a lack of consent, the Kreissparkasse would have no legally secure contractual basis for continuing the business relationship and would also have to terminate it in the end. "This is not our goal. We try to prevent it from happening at all," says Schmitz. In this respect, he could not yet give a date for possible terminations.

Sparkasse Köln-Bonn is a little further behind in terms of the approval rate: 75 per cent of customers there have given their consent to the GTC. "We currently count up to 10,000 approvals per working day, so we expect at least 95 per cent approval," says spokesperson Christian Schilling. Further contact will be sought in the coming weeks. Just like Sparkasse Köln-Bonn, Kreissparkasse Köln also plans to offer consent options via ATMs and self-service terminals. At Kreissparkasse Köln, around 80 per cent of customers have so far actively agreed to the GTC.

At Volksbank Köln-Bonn, 74 percent of customers have agreed to the GTC. "We are addressing our customers personally and digitally through various channels," says spokesperson Judith Jussenhofen. The institute has not yet planned any cancellations.

At Deutsche Bank, Postbank and Norisbank, more than 90 per cent of customers with current accounts have agreed to the prices and general conditions. "At the moment, we are still following up on certain product groups and asking for explicit consent, as required of banks by the BGH ruling," said a Deutsche Bank spokesperson.

Postbank has already terminated a five-digit number of customers who have a Giro-plus account with Postbank. Customers who did not react after several attempts to contact them received a letter of termination on 30 April and at the same time a new offer with unchanged conditions. The bank had set the account fees at zero for account holders, if they lacked consent, since the beginning of the year. According to the customer letter, if the holders continue to use their account from 1 May, they will automatically accept the offer and thus the current T&Cs. "We are interested in continuing with all customers," said the Deutsche Bank spokesperson. The offer runs until 30 June and has been well received by customers, he added.

Only a small number of customers have even made claims for repayment of earlier price increases against banks. According to the legal opinion of the banking industry, fee increases of the past three years before the ruling, i.e. since April 2018, are affected by the BGH ruling. Consumer advocates see a claim for repayment even for ten years. The Federation of German Consumer Organisations (vzbv) therefore filed lawsuits against two savings banks at the end of last year.

One of the actions for a declaratory judgement is against the Sparkasse Köln-Bonn. The bank argues that the last price adjustments were implemented at the beginning of 2018 and therefore nothing has to be paid back. So far, 498 customers have joined the lawsuit, says Sebastian Reiling from the vzbv's team for model complaints. An entry in the register of complaints of the Federal Office of Justice is still possible.

For the future, the banking industry would like to make the legal framework for changes to contracts more practical. The BGH ruling, it argued, was creating excessive bureaucracy. Therefore, the Federal Association of German Banks has first commissioned an expert opinion to explore the possibilities.