The future of banking on the back of reclaiming Discussion Area

Joe_Bloggs

@dchurch24 perhaps you mean one of these http://www.theaircar.com/
If you live a religious order you should be exempt from council tax. Enough levity!
The internet has revolutionised banking in my view. However so many banking customers customers still rely on postal statements to see their financial status. By then it is too late to do anything. Perhaps you have to be computer savvy to keep up with the current situation ? Computers are not free but given the size of refunds the banks pay out, they could give them away. Often a backup to such systems is a diary noting present and future bills and day to day expenditure.

I think one of the reasons the government clamped down on the number of Super Casinos allowed in the UK was the behaviour of the tax credit system.

J_B.

dchurch24

Computer savvy?

I think it's the banks that need to be computer savvy.

Abbey openly admit that their Internet banking does not update from Friday to Monday. I live 20 miles from the nearest cashpoint - how am I to get a balance on a Sunday afternoon?

Recession doesn't mean the things you have mentioned neccisarily.

The economy is bouyed on debt. 1.1 trillion. 1 in 4 people paying utility bills on credit cards? Petrol at the highest level the world has ever seen? Councils not being able to afford to keep public toilets open? ...and not being able to afford to cut the grass in public areas? Council tax rising at about 400% inflation? Housing at levels over 90%of the population cannot afford?

Smells recession like to me - despite what The Sun will have you believe!

Joe_Bloggs

@dchurch24.
Some banking institutions appear to work 24/7 like the Nationwide. Their efforts are thwarted when their computer systems meet up with dinosaur banks that don't invest their profits in efficient technology that could reduce the time it takes to move money. They would say they are being 'green' in pulling the plug over the weekend.
If you have long grass in a public area it is perhaps an evironmental initiative to harbour the natural habitat of flora and fauna. That is until it catches fire !
J_B.

ts_aly2000

Long grass yes, I can live with that. Come from the country here where 2 foot long grass and sheep's parsely is a pleasure to be back around after a few days in a town where ball games aren't allowed.

Onto banks and not investing, they don't! I was rolling out a worldwide real-time CRM solution for one of the (ahem) large unnamed banks a few years back and was constantly thwarted by director level management who seemed to think that they could have what they wanted if they complained at everyone for long enough, without signing off any money on leased lines and decent servers. You'd present it to them in plain bloody English and still they didn't understand.

Naturally they didn't get what they wanted. And I left, !!!!!! that!!

Joe_Bloggs

The CRM acronym does not convey it's meaning well. Infact it is difficult to say as a word. I think we have enough three letter acronyms to confuse the entire world. I propose the Anti Acronym Alliance as an institution that that stands for the representation of a term by words rather than letters at least once in any communication.
J_B.

Tootsie_Roll

Joe_Bloggs wrote:

The CRM acronym does not convey it's meaning well. Infact it is difficult to say as a word. I think we have enough three letter acronyms to confuse the entire world. I propose the Anti Acronym Alliance as an institution that that stands for the representation of a term by words rather than letters at least once in any communication.
J_B.

I'm with you 100% - when people start spouting them at me I have on occasion just turned to them and said 'It's all just another TLA (Three Letter Acronym) to me!' at which point they look at each other blankly until I explain and they realise what they have done !

It's particularly bad in IT. ts_aly2000 'You'd present it to them in plain bloody English and still they didn't understand.' Are you sure you spoke in English or TLA ?

ts_aly2000

I think they went with the system because of the catchy management speak buzz word 3 letter acronym - CRM.

Truth is that they'd spec'd and bought it before I even got there. The project had been ran past the development and systems teams, they rejected it saying it was unstable and too ambitious, and the management went ahead and bought it anyway.

It's the classic example of management thinking they're right and believing what they've been told by a company trying to sell them something. The client software repeatedly crashed. The server backend would go down several times a day (and trash the open records too).

And the reason why they didn't know about any of this is that they bought it on the word of this company's sales team. They like handed over £70k for user licences without even trialing the software. The whole thing was the biggest mess up you could imagine.

The thing with these leased lines. The 'management' were told by the company sales team that they could run the software over a VPN on the net, what the company didn't tell them was that this had only been tried for a small handful of users, say 5. Our requirement was for about 200 per site. Ultimately we needed a dedicated pipe going right across the Atlantic, which the management wouldn't sign off. We're talking about a bank here, one which had different ISP's servicing different sites, the packet loss and latency was appauling.

This is the class example of executives believing what sales tell them because what they're saying is all positive and rosy, and ignoring what the techies tell them because what they're saying what they don't want to hear.

They bought the software without even trialing it. In the end I left after a year, I couldn't put up with going into work every day and having daft hypothetical conversations with management. It really is the classic case of management-knows-best when clearly they don't.

Senior management should not be involved in decision making of what systems to purchase, "Oh we'll have that one, it's a nice black colour and looks very professional on the rack shelf."

Joe_Bloggs

The thing I find amusing customer relationship management systems is when the bank teller's eyes light up and they try and sell me all sorts of insurance. I only went into deposit a cheque !
In telephone banking it can be useful if notes of a previous conversation are taken at the time for future reference. This is so helpful in not having to explain the issue time and time again to everyone you speak to.

With record profits there is no reason that the OFT cannot further drag the banks into the twenty first century from their nineteenth century complacency. In theory I can move money instantly from any debit card I hold to one of my bank accounts. This money is treated as cash and earns interest from the moment it arrives and can be further transfered to other accounts.

There is also scope for consumers to act more responsibly with budgeting and credit. The government could act more responsibly with benefits and tax credits in helping the people they serve, manage a change in benefit level.

J_B.

foreveryoung_3

Andy_L wrote:

Titanium sting you for £2 per ATM transaction, in adation to anything the machine provider charges

I think you are misunderstanding the point I am trying to make. You make sure you dont need to use a cash point and if you have to then its not a major fortune, the benefits are, on-line shopping, paying bills over the phone, ordering take away's lol, buy train tickets, without having to carry all your cash around. Its just not in a bank. This is a safety card and a convienience card, and I can give my kids a card to pay for things. It cant go overdrawn, I think it will help me manage my finances better and be more in control.

gt94sss2

Going back to the original purpose of this thread..

I see that:

a) American Express are stopping BT's

b) Barclaycard have written to their customers, informing them of reduced "late payment" type fees but also telling most of them that their APR for purchases and/or cash transactions is increasing..

Regards
Sunil