ISA Transfer Times

Jazzer

Can anyone confirm that banks etc are obliged by HM Revenue and Customs rules to arrange transfers of cash ISAs in no more than 30 days?
I have had BIG trouble transferring my ISA from RBS to NatWest. I first sent forms on April 25th and I've been told today, August 13th, that the money has finally reached my new NatWest ISA account. My transfer forms have been mysteriously lost three times. Doesn't that fill you with confidence in NatWest? I am now fighting to back date the interest to May 25th. Am I within my rights?

GiraffeMan

Jazzer wrote: »

Can anyone confirm that banks etc are obliged by HM Revenue and Customs rules to arrange transfers of cash ISAs in no more than 30 days?
I have had BIG trouble transferring my ISA from RBS to NatWest. I first sent forms on April 25th and I've been told today, August 13th, that the money has finally reached my new NatWest ISA account. My transfer forms have been mysteriously lost three times. Doesn't that fill you with confidence in NatWest? I am now fighting to back date the interest to May 25th. Am I within my rights?

The guidance notes are a bit wishy washy.
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/isa/isa-guidance-notes-2008.pdf

It states under section 11.16

The old ISA manager must give the new ISA manager a notice in writing containing information and declaration (a transfer form - see paragraph 11.18) within 30 calendar days of the date of transfer.

The information can be given electronically and need not have a "wet" signature.
If i'm honest it may not have been your old providers fault for not supplying the transfer form earlier. i would pursue your old manager first to see what they did to chase up the transfer as they should have sent a chaser or three given the time taken to complete the transfer.

Jazzer

Thanks GiraffeMan for this info. I'm trying to hold NatWest to the info on their website:

How long does it take to transfer a Cash ISA?

No more than 30 days. We follow the rules set down by HM Revenue and Customs

masonic

I successfully got fully compensated by NatWest for the interest I lost out on after a very similar sequence of events last year.

Jazzer

NatWest are not too good at transfers huh?

financial_illiterate

Jazzer wrote: »

NatWest are not too good at transfers huh?

I had no problems at all with my Natwest transfer back in April, but there are a lot of complaints about them on here. I daresay that people are more inclined to speak up when they're aggrieved than when they're satisfied.

That said, I would have thought they'd be obliged to backdate your interest. RBS and Natwest are the same company, so they've had possession of the money the whole time.

masonic

There have been a couple of very long threads dedicated to the subject. The problem seems to be very common.

Jazzer

I eventually lost all patience with NatWest and wrote a letter of complaint to Stephen Hester, CEO with RBS (inc NatWest), and sent a copy of the letter to my branch of NatWest. Almost instantaneously all problems disappeared, the interest on my ISA was backdated to when I first applied, I was compensated for telephone calls and received copious apologies from the manager of my branch. Stephen Hester's office are doing an investigation too. I would thoroughly recommend this course of action. :T:T:T

Goldenyears

My wife asked for a instant access cash ISA transfer out of B&B/Abbey to a Skipton fixed rate on 12 May. It's just come through !! The first transfer request might never have left Skipton since she asked for a Nationwide transfer out at the same time. Nothing happened there until I personally delivered the second request form to the local Nationwide branch on 23 June. But the second request delivered to a B&B branch was lost in their internal mail. Of course you don't know this until you query it after 30+ days. I delivered the third request to B&B on 27 July with a complaint letter (thanks to this forum). The cheque was credited at the Skipton on 25 August and today we received £50 compensation in the post from Abbey.

What is to be done ? In our case the ISA teams may have been compliant all the time with the 30 day regulation in the Statutory Instrument. Perhaps their mail systems let them down. I wonder how narrow the remit of HMRC's audit is. It can't be like ISO 9000 because those auditors come down hard on communication foulups that are not corrected.

What if we all sent forms direct to the ISA teams. Thir addresses are published online by HMRC.

Edit: The advice to personally deliver the transfer out request to a local branch came from the Skipton desk staff.

Ancien_Pilote

Last October RBS Advertised a 7.8% Cash Isas for transfer to.My A&L Cash Isa had reduced to 3% so I transferred ,but it took until Nov8 to achieve it.Happy in the knowledge I was getting 7.8% I awaited my 6 month interest statement showing only 3.5% for the whole period.I started looking around ,but ALL were at or near 3.%,so I waited.My RBS Cash Isa is now 1%!!!!!A&L are now back at 3.5%for 1 year,so on Aug 10 I transferred all of it back to A&L @3.5%for one year fixed.I am still waiting!!RBS Has done absolutely nothing yet and A&L can only wait saying it has to be done within 5 weeks!!!!!This is ridiculous,and I am about to close down all my RBS Accounts,as they hit you with any and all charges they can,and then keep your money on peanut interest,whilst charging others a fortune for the privilege of going or having an overdraft.All out there watch out for RBS-I thought we Taxpayers now owned this ,but AVOID at all costs.