Natwest Account review

ashbart

Thanks to all of the support! I am glad that it isn't just me that feels disappointed with the treatment I have received.

To the NatWest staff who have replied to this thread - I have had reviews in the past and I have never signed up to any other finance as a result. The charge for my overdraft (which I received yesterday) for July was £3.25 and to be honest, I don't think that is a big deal - certainly not enough to warrant a loan for £1,600 at 8.9% APR (or similar). I have politely refused on several occassions and don't appreciate being harassed on every visit to the branch. I work very hard for my money and I am doing everything I can to rid myself & OH of credit cards, loans, and eventually overdrafts however, I will only do so in my own comfort zone. I refuse to be pushed into products - especially after I have declined over and over again.

I should not be victimised and treated as a 'bad' customer. If the advisor I spoke to on Tuesday evening had not made false claims, which I deem to be quite serious, then I would not feel this way. I am a customer of Natwest - not a client and I expect to be treated that way.

lesley1960

Nat West are always asking me to have a review and I dont even use the overdraft .
Slightly off topic but i went in there a few weeks ago to arrange a chaps payment , was spoken to as though i was a three year old , the assistant took the form to be signed off , came back about 15 mins later saying the manager wanted to know why i was making the chaps payment !! !!!!!!? told him it was my business
( oh and then noticing i had a largish sum in the account the assistant asked me if she should arrange to put it in a savings account for me )

Going back to the OP , I think banks are running scared at the moment , but they have given you an overdraft so unreasonable of them to expect you not to use it ! , but suspect the banks can do what they want

ashbart

natweststaffmember wrote: »

Ashbart, have you ever had a review with any financial institution?
It is an eye opener and does get you thinking about your finances. It will update your details as well as seeing if the bank can save you money. There is one word that you can say if you had a review when they ask you to sign on the dotted line;
NO.
The bank staff do not hypnotise you or lock the door or shine bright lights in your eyes.
Whatever I post I am gonna sound like a salesman so what the heck.
Are you aware of NatWest's guaranteed to beat on your home insurance(if you do it online and it does not come up cheaper, the branch can make sure it is sent to the underwriter to beat)?
Are you aware that natwest offer a fee free mortgage package?
The reviews are wothwhile but by all means complain about the way the advisor spoke to you because that IMHO overstepped the mark by stating it was IN BREACH of the contract. That was a bit too far.

I am fully aware of the products NatWest offer - in fact, I was considering seeing them about my remortgage however, this has left a very sour taste.

The 'in breach' remark is the main problem, for me. That is a BIG step too far.

hedleysmith

My partner and I are NOT happy with natwest bank at all. Whenever you reach someone to speak to on the phone they do not seem interested in helping you and when you do go in and see the manager of your own branch-they can't even do their job properly!
We tried closing our bank accounts that we had with them as we were fed up with their lack of help and constant bank charges that they were issuing. Only a week later to find that one of our accounts had not been closed all because the manager did not work out how much we owed them and made our current plus account go overdrawn. So now we have more charges!
Don't go to natwest, they do not take any responsibility and blame everything on you! :-(

natweststaffmember

Ashbart, I am going to revise what I have said to you.
The first part is true, the bank will always ask a customer if they can save money of the interest they are paying out on, ie overdrafts,loans and credit cards.

The comment about being "in breach of your contract" is 100% incorrect and I would complain, firstly to the branch manager about the conduct of a member of staff. That was entirely wrong.

If you are banking cheques you can avoid the cashiers by putting the cheques and paying in slip in the quick deposit box which most branches have.

Hedleysmith, had you started a thread at the time the incident happened, I could have advised you at to the course of action you could take. Your issue is not the same as Ashbert's issue.

ashbart

natweststaffmember wrote: »

Ashbart, I am going to revise what I have said to you.
The first part is true, the bank will always ask a customer if they can save money of the interest they are paying out on, ie overdrafts,loans and credit cards.

The comment about being "in breach of your contract" is 100% incorrect and I would complain, firstly to the branch manager about the conduct of a member of staff. That was entirely wrong.

If you are banking cheques you can avoid the cashiers by putting the cheques and paying in slip in the quick deposit box which most branches have.

Hedleysmith, had you started a thread at the time the incident happened, I could have advised you at to the course of action you could take. Your issue is not the same as Ashbert's issue.

Thank you for your post. I have written a letter sent by recorded delivery yesterday and my guess is, I will get a phone call at some point today. I understand that the bank will always suggest ways of saving money and this has never been my problem - it is the way in which the suggestion was conducted, as you have pointed out. Hopefully this issue will be resolved within the next few days! Thanks again - believe it or not, I do like Natwest and hope this will not affect my future dealings with them... We'll see what the branch manager has to say, first! :rolleyes:

gordon_smith_2

ashbart wrote: »

Thanks for the advice - I have checked the balance over the last 3 months and it has definitely been in the black for at least 3 days a month, each month. I just think they want us to take out a loan. I don't know what else they expect. Even if I did set up a meeting - I would refuse whatever was offered anyway.

If it was any other account - I would tell them to stuff it and open another account but, this one has been open for quite some time and it is convenient for me and I like their call centres, benefits, etc. Not to mention we've just bought our first house so I would really like to 'sit tight' in terms of finance for a while before I start making changes. If I had a lot of equity in the house and was somewhat stable, it wouldn't bother me but as the current 'recession' means I'm probably in negative equity, I'd rather make fewer applications, changes, etc....

What is an SBT card? I REALLY don't want to take out any more loans, credit cards, etc. I've got enough as it is and we've only just paid our first (of 4) credit cards off!!!

You say you want some stability, but remember that an O/D can be requested to be repaid "on demand", normally a bank would give you a month to do this. If you are almost permanently overdrawn for most of the month, to me it would seem sensible to have a loan for the overdraft, then at least you are paying off the loan every month and reducing your liabilities. It also means that they cannot call the loan in for repayment. If a request for repayment of the O/D came would you be able to repay it. I think probably not and therefore your finances could spiral out of control. Think of all the hassle in trying to open another account getting O/D facilities, changing Direct Debits etc, all within the time frame of repaying your O/D.

ashbart

gordon_smith wrote: »

You say you want some stability, but remember that an O/D can be requested to be repaid "on demand", normally a bank would give you a month to do this. If you are almost permanently overdrawn for most of the month, to me it would seem sensible to have a loan for the overdraft, then at least you are paying off the loan every month and reducing your liabilities. It also means that they cannot call the loan in for repayment. If a request for repayment of the O/D came would you be able to repay it. I think probably not and therefore your finances could spiral out of control. Think of all the hassle in trying to open another account getting O/D facilities, changing Direct Debits etc, all within the time frame of repaying your O/D.

You are missing the point, completely. Everyone wants stability and there are not many people I know that do not have an overdraft facility that they use (not necessarily rely on). Yes, an overdraft can be withdrawn however, I do not understand why they would do this without reason. We are not permanently overdrawn - that is the point.

Why would I take out a loan repaying around 8-9% interest over so many years when, at the moment, I pay around £3.50 a month on my overdraft??? How is that financially better off for me?? And how can a £3.50 charge suggest I "heavily" use my overdraft??

I think suggesting they will ask me to repay my overdraft is a bit harsh.

mrposhman

£3.50 is not heavy use. As I have said above I have been in my overdraft pretty much since I left uni.

I was paying interest on overdrafts of approaching £4k and was approached by Natwest to use their internal borrowing facility to pay the overdraft off and work my way into credit which I thought seemed a good idea. This "loan" was priced at just over 9% APR which I didn't think was too bad but due to the change in timescale of payments (ie. overdraft - no fixed timescale, loan there is) I was aware that my monthly repayments would be higher than my current payments but felt that moving more towards the debt free tag would be of benefit to me.

Having received the paperwork based on a loan of 15.9% (which after restructuring my current natwest loan would have cost me MORE for my current loan overall) I decided to complain and approached Nationwide for the loan. The loan was completed and paid within 2 weeks but my query with Natwest carried out for 8 weeks of which I received 2 letters (ever read your own complaints procedure, clearly not). Once I got the final letter, they admitted that the original loan was not only made up from incorrect figures but they couldn't even replicate the same loan quote.

The whole experience has left a very sour taste in my throat and as soon as I can I will be moving away from Natwest, bank accounts are being set up, as are credit cards and savings accounts are in the pipeline.

I refuse to deal with a bank that treats customers like c*ap (not to mention when I rang up last week after being charged £28 for being 12p overdrawn, and told by the cheeky git at the other end that "we only ask you to keep to your agreement" seemed rather arrogant of the bank being as they can't even abide with the complaints procedure that THEY WROTE) and create false loan rates in order in my opinion to confuse and rip off customers.

I would suggest to anyone to steer well clear.

amandathepanda

They won't get the boot as they were probably told to say that by their manager. I remember when all the child benefit details were stolen a year or so back, we were told to say to all customers where we could see child benefit being paid in to their account, that their account security may have been breached, and that the advisor needed to speak to them urgently. This was just a tactic to get them in to the interview room to have a review. I, and other members of staff refused as we thought this was a step too far.