Sending and receiving euro (SEPA) transfers

weliot

La Banque Postale website form for setting up a new SEPA account only offers 2 fields; for the IBAN and the BIC. If one tries to enter the Nationwide BIC (NAIAGB21) it is instantly rejected with a message that the Nationwide cannot be used for SEPA payments. I therefore entered the Intermediary Bank BIC (HSBC: MIDLGB22) and this was accepted and the name and address of HSBC were automatically filled in. When sending the payment I entered in all three available information fields the phrase "Nationwide NAIAGB21". However, the payment was rejected by HSBC. I cannot think of any other variant for sending the SEPA payment to Nationwide.

System

In April 2010, Stuart.Langsbury@nationwide.co.uk, of Payment Processing, finally admitted to me that Flexaccounts cannot receive SEPA Credit Transfers, for the reason given above: Nationwide has not made the necessary arrangement with HSBC to allow the 'straight through processing' to a Nationwide account of an SCT sent to MIDLGB22 (even though the IBAN of course indicates, twice, that the destination account is a Nationwide account).
If Nationwide have changed their stance on this, please can we have proof of this, so that I can complain (yet again!) that they haven't told me. If what Stuart Langsbury told me is still true, then further complaints to him might help to induce Nationwide to Do Something. He did also let slip that Nationwide is a major receiver of payments in euro. It is mad (assuming it is still true) that they expect senders to use the legacy, expensive, SWIFT system, with the 'MIDLGB22 as intermediary' rigmarole. And the typical customer and employee of La Poste cannot understand it at all.
http://www.nationwide.co.uk/search/DisplayArticle.aspx?article=1572

weliot

Thank you very much. I've sent an email to Mr Langsbury describing how the SEPA payment was rejected and asking what news there is from Nationwide about SEPA transfers. Also, as suggested by the Banque Postale website when it refused to accept the Nationwide BIC, I am sending the form "VOS SERVICES DE BANQUE EN LIGNE" ("Certicode_A4_14mai_09_Internet-1.pdf") to the Poste for the manual setting-up of the Nationwide account for payments. I may also attempt a fax transfer using the form "formulaire ordre transfert.pdf" but I suspect that will be expensive. I'll update in this thread as soon as I have any further information.

weliot

I got the following reply from Nationwide:
"I am sorry but we are not apart of the SEPA community, therefore can not accept those payments. As a matter of course our intermediary bank MIDLGB22, does not accept these on our behalf.
Sorry for the inconvenience.
Kind Regards"

System

weliot wrote: »

we are not a part of the SEPA community, therefore can not accept those payments.

Gibberish. The UK is, of course, (like all the EU countries) within the Single Euro Payment Area. Nationwide mean that they do not see a business case for joining the European Payments Council in their own name. Nor apparently, will they come to an arrangement with HSBC which would allow incoming SEPA Credit Transfers sent to HSBC to be processed 'straight through' to Nationwide IBANs. I do not know whether that is merely too difficult for the numpties at Nationwide, or forbidden by the EPC rules.

ant0

Hi, thanks for sharing your experiences, this is very helpful.
Does anybody know if Natwest accepts SEPA payments? I went in branch and they told me no, called and said yes - who should I believe?!
Thanks

dazza.mk

ant0 wrote: »

Hi, thanks for sharing your experiences, this is very helpful.
Does anybody know if Natwest accepts SEPA payments? I went in branch and they told me no, called and said yes - who should I believe?!
Thanks

They do, normally you'd find th BIC & IBAN relating to your account on your Bank statement

biscit

weliot wrote: »

Thank you very much. I've sent an email to Mr Langsbury describing how the SEPA payment was rejected and asking what news there is from Nationwide about SEPA transfers. Also, as suggested by the Banque Postale website when it refused to accept the Nationwide BIC, I am sending the form "VOS SERVICES DE BANQUE EN LIGNE" ("Certicode_A4_14mai_09_Internet-1.pdf") to the Poste for the manual setting-up of the Nationwide account for payments. I may also attempt a fax transfer using the form "formulaire ordre transfert.pdf" but I suspect that will be expensive. I'll update in this thread as soon as I have any further information.

I rang up Nationwide (not knowing the difference between SEPA and Swift) and told I had to quote the IBAN- when my bank does not accept the BIC of Nationwide in the SWIFT/BIC field. The woman on the phone

I got an error message of

"Die angegebene Empfängerbank unterstützt (noch) keine SEPA-Zahlungen. Um diese Zahlungen als EU-Standardüberweisungen freizugeben, löschen Sie ggf. die Referenz-Nr. und klicken Sie auf weiter. (F0120)"

on online banking, which basically says a SEPA payment can't be sent to that bank.

I'm not risking sending money to Nationwide with this confusion.

System

Open an account with a real bank

biscit wrote: »

I rang up Nationwide (not knowing the difference between SEPA and Swift) and told I had to quote the IBAN- when my bank does not accept the BIC of Nationwide in the SWIFT/BIC field. The woman on the phone

I got an error message of
on online banking, which basically says a SEPA payment can't be sent to that bank.

I'm not risking sending money to Nationwide with this confusion.

System

biscit wrote: »

I rang up Nationwide (not knowing the difference between SEPA and Swift) ...

A SEPA (Single European Payment Area) Credit Transfer is the modern standard for payments of euro (and Swedish krona) within the EU countries (including the UK), plus Switzerland. It operates without human intervention through one of the pan-European clearing houses. It is cheap; usually in practice free to private customers.
A legacy SWIFT transfer operates via interbank 'wires' (or nowadays emails), and relies on the sending and receiving banks having accounts with each other, or with a common intermediary. It is slow and ridiculously expensive.
I thought my German was quite good, but I'm not sure I understand your bank! Is it: Nationwide doesn't (yet) support SEPA payments [true, alas, and unlikely to change.] To make a standard [SWIFT?] EU payment, if necessary remove the reference number and click 'next'?