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

Former_MSE_Dan

Hi nrsql,

I PM'd you very shortly after I removed your post, in order to keep the thread flowing

Dan

nrsql

MSE_Martin wrote: »

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Yet remember customer service centers and even product websites are often out of date, incorrect and inconsistent.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

Have just skimmed the article but it says
"MSE Official News Article"
It doesn't say that it's just a summary of a press release or an advert so I wouold expect the author to have at least read the t's & c's to try and verify the info.
(Appologies if that's not what the problem is"

And can we put the product name in the title of this thread - even if it doesn't go in the article.

Is that a single pass of speech recognition - it looks very good.

LongTermLurker

G_M wrote: »

PLEASE!

b) Put provider name in thread title so we don't waste time clicking!

Thanks

ps - this is Newcastle BS 5 year Bond

This is a bad and repeating issue - sorry for the criticism, but MSE "official reports" seem to be some of the worst offenders for badly titled forum posts and the title of this thread is as bad as someone placing their first post called "please help".

MSE Guy/Dan/Martin - PLEASE can forum posts be made specific? It helps people find the threads they're interested in far easier.

Former_MSE_Dan

nrsql wrote: »

Have just skimmed the article but it says
"MSE Official News Article"
It doesn't say that it's just a summary of a press release or an advert so I wouold expect the author to have at least read the t's & c's to try and verify the info.
(Appologies if that's not what the problem is)

Hi nrsql,

MSE News stories (and the same goes for full MSE guides) are never just summaries of releases and certainly not adverts. We fully check and research all content that we publish, exactly as you would expect.

In this case, we unfortunately got the wrong information given to us from the press office - the official way of communicating to journalists.

Dan

MSE_Martin

Hi

I think you make a good point about the titles and start of these posts.

Im going to redo this one personally and from now on ask the team that all other Forum News posts follow this structure.

KDH001

I know you can withdraw cash after giving 90 days notice, but does that mean you can close the account penalty free or do you have to maintain the £5000 minimum for 5 years.

LongTermLurker

MSE_Martin wrote: »

Hi

I think you make a good point about the titles and start of these posts.

Im going to redo this one personally and from now on ask the team that all other Forum News posts follow this structure.

Thanks Martin, I think it will make a great difference to clarity.

G_M

KDH001 wrote: »

I know you can withdraw cash after giving 90 days notice, but does that mean you can close the account penalty free or do you have to maintain the £5000 minimum for 5 years.

I received this reply from NBS:


Your Enquiry
Dear Mr xxxxx,

Thank you for your recent enquiry.

If you wish to withdraw from the Newcastle Five Year Bond (1) during the term you can do so providing you give the society 90 days notice. Once the 90 day notice period has expired, you will be able to make a transaction on your account penalty free. You will continue to earn interest on your investment until the funds are withdrawn.

Unless your closing your account during the term of the investment the minimum balance must be held during the five year term.

If you have any further queries please contact us on 0845 606 5522, our opening hours are 8am-8pm Monday - Thursday, 8am - 6.30pm Friday, 9am-5pm Saturday.

Yours sincerely,

NewcastleNet Savings.

Key word: "Unless"

The parallel thread also has other similar replies.

nrsql

MSE_Dan wrote: »

Hi nrsql,

MSE News stories (and the same goes for full MSE guides) are never just summaries of releases and certainly not adverts. We fully check and research all content that we publish, exactly as you would expect.

In this case, we unfortunately got the wrong information given to us from the press office - the official way of communicating to journalists.

Dan

OK Now I'm confused - you say the product was fully researched and didn't just summarise the press release but just took the information from the press release?
That only makes sense if the only information available was the press release - which would make it very similar to a pre-release advert for the product.

A press release may be an official way of communicating with journalists but doesn't mean that should be considered the only source of information.

Glad to see that the title has been changed after I had 3 posts deleted asking for it.
Think this should be another thread as it's not really about the product but about the presentation but those threads get deleted.

Former_MSE_Dan

Hi,

Summarising a press release, and having a full conversation and list of questions answered and double-checked by a press officer, are not the same thing. We always do the latter.

It's a real shame that the wrong information was confirmed by Newcastle BS, but i hope most people think we have followed this up and tried to clarify to the best of our ability.

Thanks

Dan