ING - they've made it so hard to stay with them

beardiedog

Like many others, I became an ING customer as a result of the collapse of KE. I had a fixed rate saving account with KE at the time at around 7% which, to be fair, ING honoured. When it matured I transferred some of it to a 1 year fixed rate account at 3.5% and also kept some in their savings account at the special bonus rate for KE customers which has now ended so I need to move it.

I've recently redeemed some loan notes so I wanted to set up another FRA with them but now find that I need a minimum deposit of £50000 to open one. Seems like they don't want my custom any more.

noh

The interest rates they offer on their fixed term accounts is nothing special so why bother?

poppy10_2

noh wrote: »

The interest rates they offer on their fixed term accounts is nothing special so why bother?

Exactly - there are much better providers available.

bjorn_again

I find it very easy to stay with them. I also came in as a KE refugee and was pleased to be able to do so. They honored my FR bond that I had taken with KE and the transition of this and my wife's instant access account could'nt have been smoother. I recently closed my own instant access account for the 3.25% they were offering on new money. This took no more than four days and went like clockwork. My wife put her money into a 6 month bond with a few clicks of the keyboard.
Their customer service is brilliant, they offer cover of 100,000 euro, and imho are as safe as houses.
I learned my lesson last year, and am happy not to tart myself for rate again.

EalingSaver

There are definitely worse out there. However, in my view it is plain stupid for them to insist that their higher rates are for new customers only.

If they want ot play these games, they could advertise like that but if an existing customer phones and asks to be put on the higher rate they should just do it. I've twice tried to battle with them on this, and no luck. Am now having to go through the fag of withdrawing my money and then shutting the accounts down. That's just unnecessary hassle and cost for both sides.

And by the time I've done all that whether they will actually get to see my £50k flowing back to them is difficult to say.

Others, like Egg for example, make it easy for customers to switch to higher rate accounts (obvoiusly the preferenc would be to not play these games at all but...)

noh

I have just done that with the instant access account @3.2%
Closed and reapplied as a new customer.

Egg are a little easier but they usually require "new money" so you still have to withdraw the cash and pay it back in again

ING's fixed rate accounts all seem to require a minimum of £50k. Better interest rates with lower minimums are available elsewhere so I don't see them as competitive for fixed term accounts.

beardiedog

Thanks guys. I just think it's a bit strange that they are pushing their existing customers away to other banks, who as you say, are offering better rates. I would like to remain loyal because they basically bailed us out but they're not offering the same loyalty in return, so because of this I've moved most of my money out now and intend opening a 1 or 2 year fixed bond probably with Saga or the Post Office as soon as the transfer is complete.

Ifts

Like the OP I also became an ING customer when they took over my easy access account & my 3 year fixed rate bond that I had with Kaupthing Edge.

Originally I opted to go with the 6 month special bonus rate for ex KE customers on my easy access account but when that expired I also tried opening the 3.2% account but was told it was for new money only.

I tried to close my existing easy access account to reopen it to benefit from the better rate but was told I could not close it because I had to keep it open as part of the T&C's on the 3 year fixed rate bond I had with them.

I have now withdrawn all but the the minimum balance from the easy access account so I can keep my 3 year fixed rate bond paying 7.67% going till Sept 2011. Instead of with ING Ive now opened an easy access account with Citibank.

It is a shame when ING and others don't reward their existing customers with the better rates and insist on new money only. So although its hassle I suppose you have to vote with your feet and go elsewhere.

Agree with previous posters current ING fixed rate terms are not very good, there are better on offer from other providers with much lower minimum balances required to open them.

roddydogs

Welcome to ING theyve been messing about with existing customers for years, in their favour you only have to close for 3 working days, then open again.to get new rates. But then you lose about 6 days interest.

bjorn_again

beardiedog wrote: »

Thanks guys. I just think it's a bit strange that they are pushing their existing customers away to other banks, who as you say, are offering better rates. I would like to remain loyal because they basically bailed us out but they're not offering the same loyalty in return, so because of this I've moved most of my money out now and intend opening a 1 or 2 year fixed bond probably with Saga or the Post Office as soon as the transfer is complete.

Believe me, it will take you a lot longer to close your ING and open with Saga than it will to open the new account with ING. The whole process of closing the old account with ING and opening the new, higher rate account went smoothly for me and was completed in four days.
If you want to open a frb with ING the transfer can be done on line and is instaneous from another ING account. My wife just did it with her money.

bjorn_again

roddydogs wrote: »

Welcome to ING theyve been messing about with existing customers for years, in their favour you only have to close for 3 working days, then open again.to get new rates. But then you lose about 6 days interest.

If you are closing an account earning 0.6% to get 3.25%, six days loss of interest is minmal unless of course you are well over the "safety" limit of 100,000 euro.
If you were up to the "limit" of 100,000 euro your loss would be >10 euro.
Northern Rock is the only one that I am aware of that closes your instant access account and re-opens it at the new on-line.
It has just taken me two + weeks to get Abbey to move my Direct ISA up to the new account and the new rate.