Abbey/Satander just getting worse

[Robert Wheeler]

I have had some utterly terrible service and incompetence from Abbey/Satander in the last couple of years, but today I finally completely gave up on them.

After spending 15 minutes speaking to their increasingly poor customer service centre (which now appears to be located outside of the UK) about an unrelated problem, I tried to get the balance on my personal account. It was about £50 short of what I thought it should have been, so I kept querying what the recent charges were, and all I got were nonsensical replies.

I got home and found that my statement for last month had finally arrived. I had a glance down it and could not find the missing £50, but discovered that I have been billed £25 for an "unarranged overdraft monthly fee". It turns out that at some time recently they have changed my overdraft limit from £500 to £50 without notifying me. I had skated by a couple of pounds over the £50 limit, and as a result got hit by the £25 charge.

The most frustrating thing was that I had deliberately run this account marginally into the authorised limit every month for a couple of years in order to try and build my credit rating, as I have never actually had any credit in the past at all. I will now probably find that I have a poor credit rating.

So this was the final straw to me. I wrote to the customer service's director telling her to wipe the charge off my account, and that I would be closing all of my business and personal accounts as soon as possible. Honestly, I would rather be paying a few hundred of pounds a year to Barclays if it meant that my accounts would be dealt with in a proper fashion. It would make economic sense. Just a couple of weeks ago I spent most of a day wasting my time trying to work out what had happened to a payment we made to a royalties agency did not receive. It turned out that the payment schedule had been set up with the wrong name and the wrong reference number. It is an absolute joke.

[Williams lester]

If you think you will get better service from Barclays (or indeed any other bank), you are fooling yourself. They are all equally incompetent, the only way around this is to find one with a personal manager you can speak to to resolve any problems...

[Robert Wheeler]

As far as I am aware Barclays do have a personal manager.

Abbey/Santander are not billing me the £25 for a few more days. I wonder if they would give up on it if I closed my account before then?

[Philip Hoyle]

As far as I am aware Barclays do have a personal manager.

Who are usually about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. The better managers are taken off front-facing customer service and transferred over to "selling" their products. I used to recommend our local Barclays to our clients - the manager was brilliant but then they moved her onto sales and we've had a succession of brainless morons ever since. Not so long ago, I had to spend time trying to explain to one the legalities of a limited company - he just couldn't grasp that a limited company is a separate legal entity - if the "managers" havn't got basic knowledge like that, there's no hope for them!

[gemd89]

Alliance is the same

Gemma

[Merchant UK]

Banks are a complete nightmare at the moment, all they seem to know is how to get £20k bonus and sod all else.

When we go to the banks for a loan or mortgage they do a credit check on us, well it should be the other way round, we should do a credit check on them because they are the reckless ones :mad:

I wonder if any of the credit control guys on here can actually do a credit check on the big 5 banks, Wow that would be a great bargaining point when you want a loan :D

[longleaf1]

Don't be fooled by Nawests 'Helpful Banking'
Thats a complete joke too, I'm awaiting a reply to a recent complaint :mad:

[David Richards]

I wonder if any of the credit control guys on here can actually do a credit check on the big 5 banksActually most banks publish their ratings:

Barclays (http://group.barclays.com/Investor-Relations/Debt-Investors/Capital-and-Debt-Securities/Credit-Ratings/Credit-Ratings-definitions)
HSBC (http://www.hsbc.com/1/2/investor-relations/fixed-income/credit-ratings)
Lloyds (http://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/investors/credit_ratings.asp)
RBS (http://www.investors.rbs.com/debt_securitisation/ratings.cfm)
Santander (http://www.santander.com/csgs/Satellite?canal=CAccionistas&cid=1148970501308&empr=SANCorporativo&leng=en_GB&pagename=SANCorporativo/Page/SC_ContenedorGeneral)


Someone even created a website www.bankcreditratings.co.uk, collating all the banks' credit ratings from some of the big international agencies. Sadly it's not been updated since June 2009.

[MASSEY]

Dipping in and out of your balance would not have helped your credit. Just the fact that they give you an overdraft will show on your file and that will have been a green paid dott every month.

And the 25 unauthorised wont go on your file,

Abbey are crap they offer free business banking silmilar to A&L they stretch themselves and offer a really poor service.

Most banks have bad reviews but abbey seems to be topping the bad review list.

[matt.chatterley]

If you think you will get better service from Barclays (or indeed any other bank), you are fooling yourself. They are all equally incompetent, the only way around this is to find one with a personal manager you can speak to to resolve any problems...

Based on my personal experiences (and our experiences with our business account), avoid Barclays - they're pants when anything goes wrong.

Also avoid A&L - when we moved to Jersey and needed to close our account a few months later (no branches here), it took a long time for them to accept that they would "let us close it by letter" rather than by visiting a branch..!

I've always found Lloyds to be good - and the local branch staff helpful.

[Merchant UK]

Actually most banks publish their ratings:

Barclays (http://group.barclays.com/Investor-Relations/Debt-Investors/Capital-and-Debt-Securities/Credit-Ratings/Credit-Ratings-definitions)
HSBC (http://www.hsbc.com/1/2/investor-relations/fixed-income/credit-ratings)
Lloyds (http://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/investors/credit_ratings.asp)
RBS (http://www.investors.rbs.com/debt_securitisation/ratings.cfm)
Santander (http://www.santander.com/csgs/Satellite?canal=CAccionistas&cid=1148970501308&empr=SANCorporativo&leng=en_GB&pagename=SANCorporativo/Page/SC_ContenedorGeneral)

Someone even created a website www.bankcreditratings.co.uk (http://www.bankcreditratings.co.uk), collating all the banks' credit ratings from some of the big international agencies. Sadly it's not been updated since June 2009.

But thats for banks and if you want to invest in them, What i meant is a proper Company Credit checks showing all County Court Judgements etc... Just like any other business credit check.

And i know banks have County Court Judgements against them, because I took Nat west to Court a few years back and they didn't bother turning up, of course it was found in my favor and they had a judgement against them as well as being ordered to replay the funds back into my account.

So i wonder, if anyone can do a company credit check??
Not one for the benefit of the mega investors, but normal customers ;)

[David Richards]

But thats for banks and if you want to invest in them, What i meant is a proper Company Credit checks showing all County Court Judgements etc... Just like any other business credit check.To be honest, when dealing with any large business, knowing if they have a CCJ or two isn't going to tell you very much. Lots of big businesses are going to have CCJs, where they take a commercial decision not to defend it; i.e. they won't just pay out, but if it goes to court it's not worth the expense of turning up. It might tell you something about their customer service; but one thing this thread has proved is that with any large business, you will get a huge variety of good and bad service.

However, back to credit ratings. Knowing if the big rating agencies think my hard-earned cash is safe in that bank tells me a lot.

[gouldie0]

I'm with Barclays and wouldn't recommend them, in the process of transferring to RBS as they at least have a business manager within the branch who you can speak to face to face.

Any bank within the Santander group are pants, I'm with A&L for personal banking and they almost make it up as they go along. There communication is terrible and the customer service centres aren't up to much either.

Just my 10p worth :mad: (I've had it up to here with banks today!)

[kontracta_com]

Being with the great Santander ourselves, I've enjoyed this thread as it does mean that I know I'm not alone with my frustrations.

To be fair, the business side hasn't irked me for the last couple of calls there but in between I've been cut off numerous times as the operatives try and keep their average call times down, given wrong information, had to wait two months for an account and then had the 'phone slammed down on me after asking for an indication of how long it would take to open said account.

My recent experiences with Barclays as an affiliated business when it comes to opening bank accounts and also as a delegate on a local business course don't exactly fill me with confidence either - from an internal controls, sales pitches and customer service point of view.

I agree that whoever you are with then there will be frustrations along the way and, unfortunately, the only outlet you have to air your grievances is on a business forum. As far as I'm concerned, most of them should stay in the naughty corner for a while longer.

Although the Co-Op have always been OK!

[Williams lester]

Although the Co-Op have always been OK!

And there is where I have to disagree. I have found them to be quite possibly the least organised and responsive business I have ever had to deal with. They have made numerous mistakes which could have been crucial but have not even offered an apology (let alone compensation) to any of our clients whose money they have lost, misplaced or miscounted.

As I said earlier, every bank will have good and bad stories...but for me, Co-op are the worst and certainly one I recommend my clients avoid.

[gouldie0]

Does this not highlight how poorly they consider us as customers? Since the financial meltdown there are fewer banks on the high street and we're limited in our choices as to who we can bank with.

The government should be doing more to encourage more 'banks' into the market, I'm hoping someone like Tesco's will really take the others on. I'm not trying to say they'll succeed in being a customer friendly bank but I hope they will.

I've had the worst days with my bank's, plural because both my personal and business account providers are just a shambles who continually make things up as they go along. Where's the wine........

[mr. mischief]

We had a once in a generation opportunity to have a competitive banking industry 2 years ago and we blew it.

The more competition there is in an industry, the more regularly participants go bust - think travel agents and airlines. You can either have a competitive industry or a safe industry but not both.

In 2008 most of the UK bank were insolvent and required we the taxpayer to bail them out. If my 9 year-old son comes to me in 10 years time and says "Dad I've just blown £10k on women / booze / gambling / credit cards" I'll say "here is the £10k and these are the conditions I am going to impose on you if you accept the cash...."

The banks said "Dad, we've just blown £1,000bn on silly loans to single mother drug-addled prostities in Atlanta which we had thought were AAA rated bonds" and the country said "here is the cash and we don't mind what you do with it, pay yourselves silly bonuses again within 12 months if you like and carry on with rubbish customer service too if you like"

So that's what the banks did.

[Batra Ventures UK Limited]

Save the greif and get a private bank account.

I have one in Barclays (BGOC) and can tell, its been very good ever since.

I have had with A&L and was absolute rubbish and hence closure.

[netro1]

I don't have a business bank account, but my experience with Abbey is the same.

I got charged £25 for going over by a couple of pence - the thing is, I knew I didn't have an overdraft - so why did they allow me to go into a negative amount? I rang the customer service line and they said Visa was to blame - apparantly they don't check if you actually have the money in your account when paying online if the amount is less than £10 or something.

It is a joke, but all banks are the same - they are becoming far too powerful - the recession hasn't even given them a wakeup call, but that's a different issue.

Abbey did eventually waive the £25 charge because it was the first time I had gone overdrawn, but still - if the money isn't there - why are they allowing my card to be charged?

The appropriate word to desribe bankers rhymes with bankers, funnily enough.

FSO is a PR stunt/joke.

[wizzard]

I don't have a business bank account, but my experience with Abbey is the same.

I got charged £25 for going over by a couple of pence - the thing is, I knew I didn't have an overdraft - so why did they allow me to go into a negative amount? I rang the customer service line and they said Visa was to blame - apparantly they don't check if you actually have the money in your account when paying online if the amount is less than £10 or something.

It is a joke, but all banks are the same - they are becoming far too powerful - the recession hasn't even given them a wakeup call, but that's a different issue.

Abbey did eventually waive the £25 charge because it was the first time I had gone overdrawn, but still - if the money isn't there - why are they allowing my card to be charged?

The appropriate word to desribe bankers rhymes with bankers, funnily enough.

FSO is a PR stunt/joke.

Unless you have a Visa Electron card on your account, then no, your account isn't checked before letting a transaction go through.

[Moejoe]

I've been reading this thread with much interest as i'm trying to figure out who to set up with. I appreciate that this thread started off as a rant , and that seems to be the general tone which is healthy, but bar one user who mentioned Lloyds, and RBS, can anybody else reflect on 'good' experiences with busines accounts?

Any thoughts on HSBC?

Another user said get a personal bank acc and make the pain go away, can you do that as a Ltd company?

[Batra Ventures UK Limited]

I've been reading this thread with much interest as i'm trying to figure out who to set up with. I appreciate that this thread started off as a rant , and that seems to be the general tone which is healthy, but bar one user who mentioned Lloyds, and RBS, can anybody else reflect on 'good' experiences with busines accounts?

Any thoughts on HSBC?

Another user said get a personal bank acc and make the pain go away, can you do that as a Ltd company?

Yes, I said it but charges and min balance requirements may not suit everybody.

And its private not personal.

[Robert Wheeler]

Still having trouble getting my replacement card. I eventually called them and asked them to cancel the one that never turned up and send it to my local branch. I got a slip yesterday telling me they will be sending it in ten days to a bank 50 miles away...

Trumpet at the ready!:

*Wahh wah wah waaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!*

[grademusictutorscom]

If you think you will get better service from Barclays (or indeed any other bank), you are fooling yourself. They are all equally incompetent, the only way around this is to find one with a personal manager you can speak to to resolve any problems...

So after alll this what does anyone recommend because quite frankly, from the reviews I've seen on certain sites (reviewcentre .com being one) it seems all the major banks provide a shocking service and poor value for money and if that's the case it doesn't bode well for other startups.

[Williams lester]

So after alll this what does anyone recommend because quite frankly, from the reviews I've seen on certain sites (reviewcentre .com being one) it seems all the major banks provide a shocking service and poor value for money and if that's the case it doesn't bode well for other startups.

As per my original post you will find good and bad stories about every bank. We still recommend Santander to our clients.

[jenkinsp]

I've banked with most banks in one form or another and you get what you pay for.

I had similar problems with abbey, we do a lot of international banking and it wasnt set up for it, if we paid a bill online for 2 separate countries in a few days of each other the card would stop working as it flagged up as fraud which cost me a lot of money for missed bill payments, higher flight costs etc.

I now bank with HSBC and Barclays, it costs me a lot more to run it but I dont get nearly as frustrated as I used too with abbey and save money on not missing payments. Even though the business managers are a bit useless sometimes its a lot better than talking to someone with a local accent than in india.

[Williams lester]

I now bank with HSBC and Barclays, it costs me a lot more to run it but I dont get nearly as frustrated as I used too with abbey and save money on not missing payments. Even though the business managers are a bit useless sometimes its a lot better than talking to someone with a local accent than in india.

I had no idea that Santander's call centre was in India....they certainly do a wonderful Scottish accent!

[jenkinsp]

The main call centre doesnt, i was referring to the other banks who do.

I'm not sure about the abbey fraud team, they sounded somewhere like that, and that was the biggest problem I had with them, nearly every international payment we made had the card cancelled.

But I wasnt very fond of the service level on the phone to abbey, i found the local business manager was better for me.

[Williams lester]

But I wasnt very fond of the service level on the phone to abbey, i found the local business manager was better for me.

Quite right too, it is much better to have a local business manager.

Our Santander local business manager is excellent.

[Robert Wheeler]

Quite right too, it is much better to have a local business manager.

Our Santander local business manager is excellent.

Santander are transferring their customer service to India. Personal accounts seem to be dealt with mainly by India, Business accounts about 50/50 between India and Glasgow.

We do not have a local business manager. Santander do not like people to know that they were planning to bring business services into the branch or that business services can sometimes be accessed from the branch. I think this might have something to do with Abbey's assertion that they would never charge for their business accounts.

I think it can only be great fortune that none of your clients have had trouble with Santander, in the couple of years, just off the top of my head I have had:

1, Misspelled addresses that have never been corrected on the accounts or correspondence.

2, Confidential documents sent to entirely the wrong address, leading to a member of the public thinking our business was trying to use their address to commit a banking fraud.

3, Bank cards blocked when we use them for transactions deemed "too low".

4, All of our bank cards being blocked a two months prior to the expiry date due to "the replacement cards being printed early, on New Years day when nobody was there to put the blank cards in the machine" and thus never being sent out.

5, Payment schedules being set up incorrectly (by the Indian call centre) so that payments went out with the wrong reference number and without the company name on. They tried to put my name on it, but they could not even manage that, giving me the wrong name.

6, Sending me incomplete statements with missing dates. Imagine how I felt after two hours of scratching my head and not getting the monthly accounts to balance, when I noticed the statements had a gap of a few days between them.

7, A wonderful Business Reserve account that has a lower rate of interest than the bank account.

I could think of lots more if I tried. I think the standard really went down around the time the crisis broke. It almost seemed to me that they just got arrogant that they were the only bank that was supposedly financially secure. I can actually remember one customer service person saying word to the effect that "if you don't like our service, you can go to Barclays, but then you don't get the security you get with us, you might lose all you money".

[venderbase]

Ive banked with NatWest all my life and had my business account with them for 5 years without a problem. I'd highly recommend them.
They give you a mobile number for your business manager for any issues.

[DickM]

Santander got slaughtered by Anne Robinson on BBC TV's "Watch Dog" this evening - but given the right script and financial incentive, she could make God out to be a villain!;)

[bdw]

Santander have pledged to improve.

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/banking/2010/09/mse-interview-santander-says-sorry-for-customer-service-chaos

[David Griffiths]

Santander also got a slating in the Times a couple of weeks back - the columnist reckoned that he or she could fill their slot for the next few years if they printed all of the issues referred to them about Santander!

[bdw]

They could plead that as an aggregate of the Abbey, the A&L and Santander they were always likely to have more complaints than the others.

They could also plead extenuating circumstances due to the inherent problems of integrating all the computer systems. I have been with A&L during this process and I have not had a hint of a problem so I am happy to ride it out and give them a chance. :D