How did your Bank treat you in 2009?

[Greenlizard0]

Not bad. I'm annoyed at them for not sending a payment through in any sort of time which meant I had to pay a fine.

Good because they gave me Kaspersky Internet Security for free!

[Saracen]

I had a choice.. I paid for the service.

When you have two choices and no others.. you have to go with it, no? The bank wants a valuation if I want the service and I wanted the service so I paid.

If you want the service, you have to go with it. Faced with that situation, on principle, I'd have gone without the service. It might not be sensible to do it my way, but no way would I have paid that, as it strikes me as an utter con. They've already got a mortgage on the place, so they know it's there. A "driveby" tells them nothing, and the £50 is, IMHO, a rip-off, a scam. So, on principle, I'd have said "go hang", even if it meant I lost out on an opportunity. I would even wonder, personally, if the "driveby" actually happened at all.

So yeah, if you want the service, then they've got you by the plums and are squeezing £50 out of you. You've not got much choice. They wouldn't have squeezed it out of me though.

[cptwhite_uk]

Did you move your bank accounts?

In the end, no. Although at the time I wrote a letter of complaint I was looking at my finances and realised switching my LloydsTSB current account to a Vantage account (4% interest before tax upto £7000) was the best move I could make at the time. Luckily I become very friendly with one of the bank mangers in Sheffield, she knows me by sight now and always makes sure I'm not messed about - I have business card with direct numbers She saved them my custom. I was 100% ready to switch though, I had an online current account with NatWest set-up which would've been no problem to transfer my funds and Direct debits too. Here's the letter I wrote (but never posted after looking at what to do with my savings and deciding to use the Vantage account to get the best interest rate)

I am a long standing customer of LloydsTSB who holds both a current and savings account with your bank.

On the 6th April I unfortunately exceeded my agreed overdraft limit of £100 for a period of 48 hours due to an error on my part - I mistakenly thought I had transferred funds from my saving account to my current account to cover a large withdrawal on 31st March. This subsequently saw me go overdrawn on the date above.

Over the value of the two accounts I have never owed the bank money and averaging the value of both balances you’ll see I’ve always been ‘in the black’. On the 8th April I received a letter prompting me about the exceeded overdraft and I corrected the situation immediately online. However, having phoned your customer services I have been informed the unplanned overdraft charges cannot be removed, totalling £55.00.

While I am happy to admit I was at fault in this instance, given the value of money in my saving account, the fact I’m a long standing customer and in the interests of good customer service I am formally requesting the charges be refunded in full.

I would also like to point out no attempt was made to contact me on the 6th April in order that I might correct the situation that day so to avoid the further £20/day additional charges you’ve placed on me. This I feel this is poor customer service on your part. LloydsTSB does have multiple methods of contacting me (mobile, email, text) none of which were used to alert me.

I would request I am contacted via my mobile to inform me whether you are willing to drop the charges in this instance and also that this is backed up in writing. As you can imagine I am angry about these unnecessary charges, especially given the current climate in the economy as a whole.

If you’re unwilling to reimburse me on this issue I feel I have no other choice than to terminate my accounts with you and move to another bank. While this will cause me a great deal of paperwork I feel I have no other choice but to be as harsh in my response as I feel your unnecessary fine upon me was, I don’t like the idea of making money for people who treat me poorly.

Furthermore I find the fact you’ve waited 2 months to issue the charge even more distasteful, presumably standard practice in the hope customers will ‘let it slide’. I assure you this is not the case with me, and I already have another online account opened and ready to switch too should it come to that.

I hope you can understand my frustration and correct this matter for me by issuing a refund of £55.00 promptly.

So yeah, only becuase it was advantagous to stay was the reason I did so, not because I became 'lazy' about the issue.

[young_one]

Mine were OK, sorted my new car loan out pretty quickly and not had a problem with my current account.

They did however lock my cash isa in april for no reason and have really started to push the HSBC Plus and Premier paid services over the past 12 months.

[jim]

Which one?

I haven't been into Lloyds at all I don't think, maybe cashed a cheque or two. Staff were average, rates were average, and when they eventually gave me the student account I shouldn't technically have been given that was average too. So that'll be getting closed pretty soon.

Natwest were inept, they told me they couldn't do a certain type of bank transfer on my savings account. When I informed them that it was a major factor in me opening the account, and was specifically mentioned in point 11.3 on the Terms and Conditions for the account, they did apologise. But then they put me through to about 11 different departments, culminating in a very confused lady who rang about 3 further departments, and concluded that she needed to send a fax off to somebody every time I needed a transfer - for my online savings account. The fax that she sent never had any effect anyway, so I had to open a current account with them just to use the savings account properly. Useless. That's all been closed now.

Alliance and Leicester put my current account rate from 10% to 1% interest or something, and said they couldn't improve it. When I asked what they could do to help their unimpressed customer, they just rammed me into an appointment with a FA in the nearest branch (miles away)... extremely unimpressed... but the man then rang me to discuss things before I arrived briefly, and told me that there was nothing he could do, and I should switch bank... much more impressed. Nonetheless, with rates like that, it's getting closed. Besides, it'll be Santander by the end of the year.

So I switched to Abbey from Alliance and Leicester (ridiculous in that they're both Santander), and they've been brilliant so far, about 5 minutes from my house and they've got some really lovely staff who do anything to help me. The lady who opened my account for me is genuinely brilliant, a good laugh and twice now whilst I've been in about other matters she has offered me a fantastic savings product that beats everything else on the market. Totally not what I expected from my current account provider, and a brilliant experience compared to my previous banks. So yeah, it was pretty rubbish until I switched to Abbey, now I'm delighted

[Brucelles]

Mine was excellent. The caveat there is that it is Societe Generale, Limoux branch in the south of France. Every dealing I had with British banks was disappointing.

[Zak33]

from the results so far I'd say we have a good majority either average or above with their banks.

I'm pleasantly suprised tbh

[scaryjim]

... Luckily I become very friendly with one of the bank mangers in Sheffield, she knows me by sight now and always makes sure I'm not messed about - I have business card with direct numbers ...

Yeah, the only good service I've had with Abbey this year has been one or two decent people in branch - but I've also seen some right arses in branch too. As you say, good branch staff can save custom, but I've been too messed about this year to stay

So yeah, only becuase it was advantagous to stay was the reason I did so, not because I became 'lazy' about the issue.

Fair enough - can't fault your reasoning

... it was pretty rubbish until I switched to Abbey, now I'm delighted

So you stole all the good customer service?

[jim]

So you stole all the good customer service?

I did actually read your post before I wrote my thoughts down

Don't know how to explain it though tbh

[CrazyMonkey]

My Halifax current account experienced a fraudulent withdrawal of a few hundred last year. Halifax refunded me the money within 7 days, couldn't have been more pleased. Apparently my card was cloned at my local asda (which i went to once last year...)

[scaryjim]

I did actually read your post before I wrote my thoughts down

Don't know how to explain it though tbh

If you're getting most of your service in branch that could be the answer - I don't have easy access to a branch any more (the nearest one to my workplace is 1.5miles away and is the central Manchester one so always heaving and massively understaffed). When I could get to a branch (Eccles and Bolton, usually) I've often had reasonable service, although there've been a number of things that staff in the branch couldn't do for me because their new systems simply can't handle it.

But some of the decisions they've made leave me flummoxed - particularly with my card:
they decided to change the type of card I was allowed on my account, which meant I had to order the new card rather than it being sent out automatically, but they didn't bother telling me any of this, so when I rang up a couple of days before my card expired to ask why I hadn't received a new one I was told I wouldn't be getting one for 7 - 10 working days. And of course, my internet banking is linked to my card, so once the old card expired I wouldn't have any access to internet banking, and the only way I could do any banking at all would be to go to a branch with my old card and photo-id! They've also failed to inform me appropriately of other changes to my banking, and generally messed me about

Plus, as I said, for a long time my nearest branches were the central Manchester ones which meant that it always took over half an hour to get served: and a lot of the staff in there were very poor indeed; unhelpful and sometimes downright rude.

Oh, and there was that whole farce at the start of the year when it was impossible to close a bank account because they couldn't write up interest in branch so the account always had more transactions outstanding.

And there's the new decision they've taken that you can't withdrasw less than £30 over the counter (so if you have less than a tenner in your account you're stuffed for withdrawing any money at all...)

As I said in my original post, up until October 2007 I was a very satisfied Abbey customer, having both my joint account and my business account with them. Since then their levels of customer service have crashed appallingly, in my experience...



Apologies for the rant - I'll get off my box now.

[manwithnoname]

My bank, did everything I expected of them, but I expect very little from them, we have history http://forums.hexus.net/general-disc...ever-rant.html

This year them didn't nothing to annoy me.

[jim]

If you're getting most of your service in branch that could be the answer - I don't have easy access to a branch any more (the nearest one to my workplace is 1.5miles away and is the central Manchester one so always heaving and massively understaffed). When I could get to a branch (Eccles and Bolton, usually) I've often had reasonable service, although there've been a number of things that staff in the branch couldn't do for me because their new systems simply can't handle it.

But some of the decisions they've made leave me flummoxed - particularly with my card:
they decided to change the type of card I was allowed on my account, which meant I had to order the new card rather than it being sent out automatically, but they didn't bother telling me any of this, so when I rang up a couple of days before my card expired to ask why I hadn't received a new one I was told I wouldn't be getting one for 7 - 10 working days. And of course, my internet banking is linked to my card, so once the old card expired I wouldn't have any access to internet banking, and the only way I could do any banking at all would be to go to a branch with my old card and photo-id! They've also failed to inform me appropriately of other changes to my banking, and generally messed me about

Plus, as I said, for a long time my nearest branches were the central Manchester ones which meant that it always took over half an hour to get served: and a lot of the staff in there were very poor indeed; unhelpful and sometimes downright rude.

Oh, and there was that whole farce at the start of the year when it was impossible to close a bank account because they couldn't write up interest in branch so the account always had more transactions outstanding.

And there's the new decision they've taken that you can't withdrasw less than £30 over the counter (so if you have less than a tenner in your account you're stuffed for withdrawing any money at all...)

As I said in my original post, up until October 2007 I was a very satisfied Abbey customer, having both my joint account and my business account with them. Since then their levels of customer service have crashed appallingly, in my experience...



Apologies for the rant - I'll get off my box now.

My branch is only a little local one, there's a bigger branch in the nearest town with a proper shopping high street, and I'm not so keen on that, though I've only been there twice... just out of convenience because something struck me whilst I was out. Exactly as you say, too many people, not enough staff. Constantly asking people to use deposit boxes, cash machines and so on rather than the counter staff... which is fine, but personally I find it a bit frustrating because I'm certainly not queuing out of choice. If they think I should drop a four-figure cheque into a little black box then I'll change bank

I'm guessing that's where this £30 limit has come in, trying to make people use cashpoints, but I don't really see the point. I'd be half tempted to withdraw £30 and then pay in £20 just to see how they react

What I have noticed though is that the telephone support are virtually all abroad and clueless with Abbey. Alliance & Leicester had brilliant telephone staff, they did absolutely everything and never passed you onto somebody else. Person 1 had the answer, job done. That was extremely important, because there was no branch nearby. With Abbey on the other hand, the telephone banking is absolutely dire. I rang them up after I got my account to verify that my overdraft was free, that I was receiving 6% on my current account, and that the savings account they'd opened was 6% as well. He asked me when I opened my account, and various questions about its specifics (i.e. did you switch from another provider) - he didn't know them - and then said that judging by the circumstances I probably had a 0% overdraft for 3 months, and said that in that case I had 6% on my current account. Then we started with the savings, and he told me it was 4% - I told him I'd been told it was 6%, and he responded by saying that it might well be, but he wasn't sure which issue of the account I'd been given. I realised that he was just looking through the terms of each issue of each account and trying to narrow it down - apparently he couldn't get the issue of the account up on the screen, and neither could he see its interest rate. Instead he just had to ask circumstances and guess at the issue. At the end of the day though, I've got a branch nearby with a couple of employees that know my name, so the fact that the telephone support is dreadful isn't such a big problem - it's disappointing, but it certainly isn't something that would make me change bank.

So yeah, I gave up on the telephone stuff fairly quickly, absolutely useless. I was warned about very poor service from Abbey, but provided I go to the right place its fine. They seem to know about a lot of loopholes and faster methods in branch which makes it a lot easier. For instance, my job title just does not exist in their database, so the lady who was setting up my account just put something ridiculous into there... which I would never have done myself by post or online for fear of getting into bother. And when I opened an online savings account attached to my current account it asked me to post off some ID... again the branch staff came to the rescue and "identified me in-branch" and then faxed them something to sort it out.

So you're probably right, the systems are all shot to hell since Santander took over... maybe the people at my branch are just either better at forcing it to work, or happy to bodge it until it does what it was probably meant to in the first place.

That would explain why it's such a mess behind the scenes but seems to do okay for me. And at the end of the day, I suppose that's all I care about

[TooNice]

I'm guessing that's where this £30 limit has come in, trying to make people use cashpoints, but I don't really see the point. I'd be half tempted to withdraw £30 and then pay in £20 just to see how they react

I remember a time when you could withdraw multiples of 5. I am not imagining that am I?

[scaryjim]

I remember a time when you could withdraw multiples of 5. I am not imagining that am I?

Some cash machines still have £5 notes in them - mostly in towns / cities with a high proportion of students. But the vast majority of cash machines for the vast majority of my banking life have only dispensed £10 and £20 notes.

Over the counter you *should* be able to draw out whatever you like, IMNSHO. Imagine you only have £9 in your account. You *can't* use a cash machine because you don't have £10 to take out. If your account is with the Abbey, you cannot access your money at all, by any means, regardless of what you try. It's not the final straw for me, because I'd already decided to leave before they did that, but it's a fine example of the kind of deteriorating service I've been receiving over the last 2 years

Anyone got any horror stories about Barclay's before I give them my wages?

[menthel]

I find smile to be great all of the time. Only problems are when I forget to tell them I am abroad!