When is an available balance not available??

chocdonuty

When it's a co-op bank acount it seems. I paid in a cheque at the post office on monday, forgot all about it and when I spotted the extra amount on my internet banking i rang and enquired abot it (mind like a sieve!) I was told that even that it shows as available it is not and if i try to withdraw against it i may be charged!:eek:
Is it just me or have every other bank i have used have a simple system - If your money is available it will show in the available balance, if it is not and waiting to clear it is shown in the account balance.
It's a good job I phoned this morning as I would have just taken the money out presuming it was 'allowed' and be charged for it too!:mad:
Anybody else had this problem and what happened? did you get charged?

Lokolo

Yes but usually the balance shown is the account balance, not the available balance. This is the case with HSBC anyway.

hermoine_2

I am with the Co-op and they are terrible at letting you know how much is in your account. They seem to take an age to clear card payments so you think you have money in your account and then suddenly it is gone because something your purchased 4 days ago has finally cleared your account. The worst one was something I bought 5th of Feb finally cleared my account on 14th April!!! It took me into overdraft without me even knowing! I do not have an overdraft on my account so I got the nasty letter.

I do not think that any other bank takes so long to make payments, with my husbands Barclays account the money seems to go instantly from the account when he buys something with his card.

The Co-op also take ages to clear a cheque it can be 8 days if you pay it in and the weekend gets in the way - heaven knows how long if the bank holiday intervenes.

H:rotfl:

Hazzanet

hermoine wrote: »

heaven knows how long if the bank holiday intervenes

An extra day?

bigbum_2

chocdonuty wrote: »

When it's a co-op bank acount it seems. I paid in a cheque at the post office on monday, forgot all about it and when I spotted the extra amount on my internet banking i rang and enquired abot it (mind like a sieve!) I was told that even that it shows as available it is not and if i try to withdraw against it i may be charged!:eek:
Is it just me or have every other bank i have used have a simple system - If your money is available it will show in the available balance, if it is not and waiting to clear it is shown in the account balance.
It's a good job I phoned this morning as I would have just taken the money out presuming it was 'allowed' and be charged for it too!:mad:
Anybody else had this problem and what happened? did you get charged?

I'm a new co-op customer, and i'm a bit annoyed that transactions take so long to up-date onto the account.

For this reason, i won't set-up any direct debts with them. I think it'll be too risky as you can't take the given account info for granted. It's a shame, because i like the overall co-op service i've received to date.

bigbum x

suzieq

Not with Barclays either, as I have just found out. I transferred £100 from my Barclays ISA to my Barclays current account on Fri eve last week, it appeared in my current a/c immediately, as it always does, so I trfd it out to my Lloyds current a/c, as I always do.

I have since received a letter saying I went overdrawn by £100 so am being charged for the privilege :mad:.

So, I called them earlier, to be told that although online transfers between accounts are immediate, anything after 6.30pm on a Fri eve will not be available to use til Monday morning (make your mind up then, which is it?) and I'm currently writing a strongly worded letter to the CEO to see if they'll cancel the charge, and if not, I'm closing my accounts.

realaledrinker

Some misinformation here.

Debit card payments will clear 2 working days after they have been submitted to the Visa network by the merchant. Co-op do not 'delay' these.

Direct debits will hit your account on the day mandated by your supplier.

BACS salary credits ditto.

Agree the available/account balance thing is confusing. I can only assume "available" means available to earn interest (laff) given the way cheque clearing works for all banks:

Daniel runs a window cleaning business and he only accepts cash or cheques as payment. Daniel collects all cheques made out to his company from the previous week and takes them into his bank to pay in on Monday morning.

His company account starts to earn interest on the money on Wednesday (+2 days), and by Friday morning (+4 days) his bank will enable him to withdraw the money from the deposited cheques from the account, even though the cheques could still bounce.

By the end of the following Tuesday (+6 days), he can be certain that the cheques will not bounce, and the money from them cannot be reclaimed from the company account without his consent.