MSE News. Save at 5% with access to your cash (Newcastle BS 5% Bond) NOW CLOSED

dov

Its been updated!!

Note: Unfortunately, Newcastle Building Society gave us incorrect information when this article first appeared late afternoon on Monday, 13 July (it is now correct).
The society told us that no interest would be earned during the 90-day notcie period but this is not true. Interest will be earned during that period.
A Newcastle BS spokesman says: "We apologise for any inconvenience caused."

[STRIKE]No mention of the imminent closure of the bond today or tomorrow in the updated article.[/STRIKE]

Former_MSE_Dan

Hi folks,

Thanks for all the comments on the thread. We have been working hard on this all morning, and have discovered that completely inaccurate information was given out by Newcastle BS's press office.

We checked all the points you have raised prior to publishing the article, as we fully research each and every piece of information that we put up on the website. We also read the forum as much as time allows, and the kind of feedback given here is very helpful in helping us speedily get things corrected.

We're talking to Newcastle BS to get an explanation of how the wrong information was given out, and just want to assure you all again that we do our research thoroughly at all times. This is a very unfortunate, and thankfully rare, occurence of the wrong information being passed on by a bank to us.

Sadly, we can't be everywhere and read everything on the forum, but we endeavour to especially read feedback to our own threads, and this product was actually picked up thanks to an email sent to [email protected]. Also, we start a discussion thread for the majority of news stories as it is important to us to improve the link between the main MSE site and the forums, and news links both ways.

Dan

Former_MSE_Dan

In addition, I've just received this apology from Newcastle for the original incorrect info supplied:

Newcastle_BS_Press_Office wrote:

[FONT=&quot]Newcastle Building Society can confirm that the Five Year Fixed Rate Bond allows withdrawals with 90 days notice with no loss of interest. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Interest is paid right up until the money is withdrawn from the account contrary to what was reported earlier and this information was supplied by Newcastle Building Society. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
Apologies for the inconvenience. [/FONT]

frames1_uk

phew, thanks for that Dan

Speculator

In the future, it may be advisable to check with the savings department as well as the press office regarding the Terms and Conditions of an account before publishing any article.

tiptoe_mouse

Speculator wrote: »

In the future, it may be advisable to check with the savings department as well as the press office regarding the Terms and Conditions of the account.

Indeed. The most disappointing thing about this whole debacle is that the correct information was there on the boards all along. It is a shame that MSE now wait for (incorrect) press releases before doing articles, rather than make use of the incredible resource that is the forum.

And the updated article still doesn't mention a hugely important point - the bond is available as an ISA and accepts transfers in.

tiptoe

SnowMan

Many thanks Dan :T:T:T

MSE_Martin

tiptoe_mouse wrote: »

Indeed. The most disappointing thing about this whole debacle is that the correct information was there on the boards all along. It is a shame that MSE now wait for (incorrect) press releases before doing articles, rather than make use of the incredible resource that is the forum.

And the updated article still doesn't mention a hugely important point - the bond is available as an ISA and accepts transfers in.

tiptoe

I'm sorry but I fundamentally disagree with this, and I think it misunderstands the difference between a forum and a professional journalistic website.

Both work well, but the information, checks and legitimacy have very different standards and must do so.

The forums are great and we look at them with interest but as it says at the top of the page "Remember, this is an open forum! Anyone can post so always exercise caution when acting on info" and both we and other users need to remember that.

Yet remember customer service centers and even product websites are often out of date, incorrect and inconsistent. And we need to have official answers which are both recorded, verifiable, and evidential.

The press office is the Official channel for any information and often customer service or savings departments have the wrong info - and are inconsistent.

The press office represents the official company line, and means if there's a problem as we have it in writing (as we did in this case) we can argue VERY strongly that they should follow it and rectify it.

In this case the press office made a mistake. That happens, but that doesn't mean we were wrong to do use it.

People may remember the Barclays 7% regular saver issue, and how late you could get it. Customer service/savings departments gave out over 10 different iterations of the answer many were totally incorrect.

We had a consistent answer from head office, something we coudl use as a weapon to ensure fair play, and indeed we did to ensure that all customers got the deal as promised.

With Newcastle, the product was actually better than the press office's eroneous info said it was - so there's no need to rectification. Yet had it been that it said the product was better than it was, then we would've been able to use our written published info from the press office to push the society to either honour its pledges or allow people to back out if they wanted to.

The team and I work very hard to provide the right info, and we check it diligently. I require the team to keep records of replies or contemporaneous notes if it is on the phone - so we have legitimate proof of the info given.

We don't do our jobs lightly or without care - and while in this case sayin "it was right on the forum" as we all know sometimes people post on here for the wrong reasons, or simply misunderstand - and we cannot rely on that as a hardcore source.

Martin

PS Please forgive typos, have bad RSI and am using speech dictation

Etccarmageddon

Speculator wrote: »

In the future, it may be advisable to check with the savings department as well as the press office regarding the Terms and Conditions of an account before publishing any article.

why? you should be able to rely on a press office to get their facts right. it's not the job of MSE's staff or anyone else to ensure the press office are competent at their jobs.

nrsql

G_M wrote: »

PLEASE!

a) Lots of threads on this already
b) Put provider name in thread title so we don't waste time clicking!

Thanks

ps - this is Newcastle BS 5 year Bond

"
b) Put provider name in thread title so we don't waste time clicking!"
Still not actioned and posts I add about this seem to disappear!

As Martin says above

"The forums are great and we look at them with interest but as it says at the top of the page "Remember, this is an open forum! Anyone can post so always exercise caution when acting on info" and both we and other users need to remember that. "

Apparently not.