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Natwest Problems!
Hey guys,
Just wandering if someone can shed some light on this.
I have been treated SO badly with Natwest - instead of me explaining whats gone on, I will copy and paste the letter I have sent to them.
I just wanted to make them aware of the problems that they can cause customers, and if they do something about it then great, if not then all is not lost.
What you guys think?
Sorry guys, its quite long!
Dear Sir/Madam,
I am writing to you today because I have a complaint at the way I have been dealt with as a customer by Natwest in regards to a loan I have taken out with yourselves. I would also like to highlight how rudely I have been spoken to by someone in your Collections Team.
Towards the end of Year 2008, I decided to take my banking elsewhere simply because of the fact I had been dealt with by yourselves. There was an overdraft that was on the account that needed to be paid off, therefore on 27th November 2008 I took out a loan of £2100.00 and agreed to pay £60.96 a month to pay this off.
Since the day this was opened, it has been a complete nightmare. I agreed on the loan agreement for the payments to be initially taken out on the 2nd of every month. These payments would come from Lloyds TSB, with who I do my everyday banking with now. On the 2nd January 2009, a payment came into my Natwest Current Account and went into the loan account on the same day. For some reason, I had been given an Unpaid Item Charge of £38.00
I called up the loan department to discuss why this was and spoke to someone. He kindly told me that it was a mistake and I shouldn’t have been charged. He therefore, gave me a refund of the charge and suggested that the £60.96 that comes from Lloyds TSB came in earlier into my Current Account. I therefore decided to change this so it arrived into my Current Account on the 26th of each month, as opposed to the date previously which was the 2nd of every month.
A payment then came into my Natwest Current Account on the 26th Jan and you took the £60.96 out of my account on the 2nd February 2008. Then, for some odd reason I had a U/D charge in the loan account and the payment was taken back out. Why this was done or the reasoning behind this, I do not know. A loan shortfall was taken out of my current account of £61.81 on the 27th January 2009 and put into the loan on 10th February 2009. Again, why this was done or the reasoning behind this, I do not know.
I then notice another unpaid item charge had been given against me on 2nd February 2009. The advisor then told me that the previous advisor that told me to ensure the money was in the account was wrong – he then refunded me the payment on 5th March 2009 (REFUND-BANK ERROR) and admitted that this was an error of the bank and not to myself.
As you can see, I am being totally messed around by your members of staff. Why can this not have been easy where you just simply take the money? Instead, you are messing me around and taking charges from the account whenever you please. Every month, £60.96 had been transferred from my Lloyds Current Account; into my Natwest Current Account therefore the money was always in there for you to take to pay the loan.
This advisor then advised me to do what I was doing before and as you can see from my statements, it was going smoothly until September 2009. For some reason, a charge of £28.00 was taken on the 7th September 2009. Then, on the 28th September 2009 a payment of £60.96 had come in, but for some reason the day after this, you took loan arrears of £62.02 from my current account and put that into the loan. Again, why was this done? I had seem to have sorted out the problem before - but for some reason in September you take loan arrears from me? Another unpaid item fee of £38.00 was taken... again, I pose the question why? The money is simply in there for you to take, so why can’t it be an easy process?
It only became apparent to me that the loan was in arrears after checking my Equifax Credit File. The first question I would like to ask is to why I am being penalised for the errors that you, as a bank, have made? My credit file shows that I have missed two payments from the loan. This is INCORRECT information as the money has been there for you to take.
At this stage, I simply had enough. I called on 19/01/2010 and paid the overdraft off – this way, I do not have to deal with the poor service I had been receiving off you again.
My next complaint is to do with a GONE AWAY record that has been posted against me on my Credit File.
I checked my credit file and saw that there is a GONE AWAY record that is attached to this loan agreement. I moved home in June 2009 and I went into a branch to get this changed. Therefore, I queried this with Equifax using their online dispute facility. I have enclosed a copy of all the questions I posted through Equifax and it includes the responses from your team who deal with this at Natwest.
On the 18/12/2009, I wrote to Equifax and explained that a GONE AWAY record had been attached to the credit agreement and asked if it could be investigated as I changed my address with Natwest in June 2009.
A response was given from Natwest on 22/12/2009 saying:
“Customer will have to contact his branch to update his address as still showing gone away.”
Having done this already in June 2009, I followed the information given and went into the Bilston branch on the 11/01/2010 and spoke to an advisor called Rav. I explained to her that I need to come into branch and change my address. She asked for a form of ID, so I gave her my driving licence which shows a photo of me, and my current address. She took this from me and her words were, “This address is already on the system Mr Patel and was changed on 5th June 2009”
As previously mentioned to you in the dispute with Equifax, the information I was giving is correct. Again, the poor customer service you have given here is atrocious.
I then wrote back to Equifax on the same day and asked someone to sort this out because the information I was giving all along was correct.
Someone from Natwest added information in on 14/01/2010 saying, “Checked our records and advise that customer's address was changed to ******* on 16/12/09, this was the address confirmed to customer by Rav at Bilston branch.Customer should contact his own branch with the current address.As far as the address on the credit agreement is concerned this will always remain the address customer was at when loan agreed,this will never change.”
This again, is incorrect information. The address was not changed – it never even got updated because the address on the system was the correct one all along. And, as for the statement saying that the address on the credit agreement will never change, are you telling me that customers who have loans with you are always going to have a GONE AWAY record made against their name even if they move house? If this is true, I find it somewhat bizarre – you are penalising your customers with bad marks against their credit file if they move home if this is the case.
All I am asking for you to do is to remove this from my credit file – I have done and followed instructions by changing my address when I moved, so why should I be penalised?
My last complaint is the poor customer service, the attitude and the incompetence of a member of staff who works in your Collections Department called Deepa Maisuria.
I called the Collections Department on 19/01/2010 to pay off the loan and clear it all, as explained earlier this was because I do not want to have dealings with you anymore.
I spoke to Deepa and she advised me that all calls are recorded and then I explained that I want a settlement figure as I am paying this loan off – she said it to me and I asked if she could call me back, to which she agreed.
She rang me back and I said I need about half an hour so if she could call me back, that would be fine? Her exact words to me are, “This is affecting your credit file, it’s no loss to us as a bank as we can simply default the account and take it to a debt collection agency... how will you be paying, by credit or debit card?” Much to my shock at the way I had just been spoken to, I advised her that I would simply need another half an hour then the whole loan will be paid off. She said, “You need to pay this now...” I then explained about the previous problems I have been having with Natwest and her attitude was terrible. She looked through the loan account and said, “Its all your fault Mr Patel, its nobody’s fault here.”
I then asked her as to why no-one had written to me with regards to this information and as to why the loan was in arrears. She told me that all my mailings from the bank had been redirected back to branch from 17th November 2009. I asked her why no-one had told me about this and queried what is the point of you taking customers addresses and contact details. Her response was, “No-one here has the time to sit down and look at all these accounts, you need to pay now anyway.”
Not quite sure if you give commission or bonuses to members of staff who take payments from customers, but her whole mannerism, her attitude and her tone of voice is poor. I work in the Customer Service industry myself and I would never ever get away with speaking to customers like the way she spoke to me. She also advised me at the start of the call that all calls are recorded... I am asking you please (for her benefit, not mine) if you can listen into the call and address her on her customer service skills and maybe send her back for retraining or refresher training in order for her attitude to improve greatly. I won’t go into great detail on this as I am sure you will hear from the phone call, but blaming the Royal Mail Postal System or blaming my neighbours taking my mail away from me as to why I never got my statements from June 2009 (when I changed my address) to November 2009 is something that she cannot really comment on.
I would like to refer to your banking code that I have found on your website.
You state the following:
· We will help you use your account or service by sending you regular statements
(where appropriate) and we will keep you informed about changes to the interest rates,
charges or terms and conditions.
This has not been followed. You have NOT sent me regular statements, you have not kept me informed of any changes to interest rates, any charges that have been applied to my account and you have not informed me that my loan was in arrears and therefore making my credit report being viewed to other possible lenders as poor. I followed your instructions given to me on this website: http://www.natwest.com/personal/current-accounts/g4/common-questions.ashx#change_address
and this has not happened.
You also state:
· We will deal quickly and sympathetically with things that go wrong and consider all cases
of financial difficulty sympathetically and positively.
When things went wrong at the start of the loan, your advisors did deal quickly by refunding me of any charges that were done, but this doesn’t seem to have helped the matter as wrong information was given to me and this then caused the loan to turn into arrears. You have also not followed this in the way your member of staff spoke to me on the phone. I advised her I could not pay at that moment in time... threatening to default the account and taking the account to a debt collection agency is not dealing with the case sympathetically and positively. Blaming the Royal Mail postage system and even my neighbours is far from being positive. Giving the credit reference agencies wrong information which hinders my credit report from other people is not dealing with something quickly and sympathetically.
· We will publicise this Code, have copies available and make sure that our staff are trained
to put it into practice.
I have to say some members of your staff are not trained to put this banking code into practise.
I am now happy to say that my business with Natwest is nearly completed, and with the service that you have given to me in the past 12 months, I will never be returning.
My father and mother have business accounts with you, and I will be advising them to take their business elsewhere. You have also been treating them poorly and unfairly and as I type this letter, they are in the process of changing banks because of the poor service I have received, as well as them.
I would please ask you, as a business to investigate the matters mentioned in this letter. I would please ask for a refund of the charges made to my account and any charges that were made in error to the loan account.
If I cannot come to a suitable arrangement from this, I will be contacting the Financial Ombudsman Service and my local Consumer Advice Bureau and will be taking this matter further.
Yours Faithfully
Just wandering if someone can shed some light on this.
I have been treated SO badly with Natwest - instead of me explaining whats gone on, I will copy and paste the letter I have sent to them.
I just wanted to make them aware of the problems that they can cause customers, and if they do something about it then great, if not then all is not lost.
What you guys think?
Sorry guys, its quite long!
Dear Sir/Madam,
I am writing to you today because I have a complaint at the way I have been dealt with as a customer by Natwest in regards to a loan I have taken out with yourselves. I would also like to highlight how rudely I have been spoken to by someone in your Collections Team.
Towards the end of Year 2008, I decided to take my banking elsewhere simply because of the fact I had been dealt with by yourselves. There was an overdraft that was on the account that needed to be paid off, therefore on 27th November 2008 I took out a loan of £2100.00 and agreed to pay £60.96 a month to pay this off.
Since the day this was opened, it has been a complete nightmare. I agreed on the loan agreement for the payments to be initially taken out on the 2nd of every month. These payments would come from Lloyds TSB, with who I do my everyday banking with now. On the 2nd January 2009, a payment came into my Natwest Current Account and went into the loan account on the same day. For some reason, I had been given an Unpaid Item Charge of £38.00
I called up the loan department to discuss why this was and spoke to someone. He kindly told me that it was a mistake and I shouldn’t have been charged. He therefore, gave me a refund of the charge and suggested that the £60.96 that comes from Lloyds TSB came in earlier into my Current Account. I therefore decided to change this so it arrived into my Current Account on the 26th of each month, as opposed to the date previously which was the 2nd of every month.
A payment then came into my Natwest Current Account on the 26th Jan and you took the £60.96 out of my account on the 2nd February 2008. Then, for some odd reason I had a U/D charge in the loan account and the payment was taken back out. Why this was done or the reasoning behind this, I do not know. A loan shortfall was taken out of my current account of £61.81 on the 27th January 2009 and put into the loan on 10th February 2009. Again, why this was done or the reasoning behind this, I do not know.
I then notice another unpaid item charge had been given against me on 2nd February 2009. The advisor then told me that the previous advisor that told me to ensure the money was in the account was wrong – he then refunded me the payment on 5th March 2009 (REFUND-BANK ERROR) and admitted that this was an error of the bank and not to myself.
As you can see, I am being totally messed around by your members of staff. Why can this not have been easy where you just simply take the money? Instead, you are messing me around and taking charges from the account whenever you please. Every month, £60.96 had been transferred from my Lloyds Current Account; into my Natwest Current Account therefore the money was always in there for you to take to pay the loan.
This advisor then advised me to do what I was doing before and as you can see from my statements, it was going smoothly until September 2009. For some reason, a charge of £28.00 was taken on the 7th September 2009. Then, on the 28th September 2009 a payment of £60.96 had come in, but for some reason the day after this, you took loan arrears of £62.02 from my current account and put that into the loan. Again, why was this done? I had seem to have sorted out the problem before - but for some reason in September you take loan arrears from me? Another unpaid item fee of £38.00 was taken... again, I pose the question why? The money is simply in there for you to take, so why can’t it be an easy process?
It only became apparent to me that the loan was in arrears after checking my Equifax Credit File. The first question I would like to ask is to why I am being penalised for the errors that you, as a bank, have made? My credit file shows that I have missed two payments from the loan. This is INCORRECT information as the money has been there for you to take.
At this stage, I simply had enough. I called on 19/01/2010 and paid the overdraft off – this way, I do not have to deal with the poor service I had been receiving off you again.
My next complaint is to do with a GONE AWAY record that has been posted against me on my Credit File.
I checked my credit file and saw that there is a GONE AWAY record that is attached to this loan agreement. I moved home in June 2009 and I went into a branch to get this changed. Therefore, I queried this with Equifax using their online dispute facility. I have enclosed a copy of all the questions I posted through Equifax and it includes the responses from your team who deal with this at Natwest.
On the 18/12/2009, I wrote to Equifax and explained that a GONE AWAY record had been attached to the credit agreement and asked if it could be investigated as I changed my address with Natwest in June 2009.
A response was given from Natwest on 22/12/2009 saying:
“Customer will have to contact his branch to update his address as still showing gone away.”
Having done this already in June 2009, I followed the information given and went into the Bilston branch on the 11/01/2010 and spoke to an advisor called Rav. I explained to her that I need to come into branch and change my address. She asked for a form of ID, so I gave her my driving licence which shows a photo of me, and my current address. She took this from me and her words were, “This address is already on the system Mr Patel and was changed on 5th June 2009”
As previously mentioned to you in the dispute with Equifax, the information I was giving is correct. Again, the poor customer service you have given here is atrocious.
I then wrote back to Equifax on the same day and asked someone to sort this out because the information I was giving all along was correct.
Someone from Natwest added information in on 14/01/2010 saying, “Checked our records and advise that customer's address was changed to ******* on 16/12/09, this was the address confirmed to customer by Rav at Bilston branch.Customer should contact his own branch with the current address.As far as the address on the credit agreement is concerned this will always remain the address customer was at when loan agreed,this will never change.”
This again, is incorrect information. The address was not changed – it never even got updated because the address on the system was the correct one all along. And, as for the statement saying that the address on the credit agreement will never change, are you telling me that customers who have loans with you are always going to have a GONE AWAY record made against their name even if they move house? If this is true, I find it somewhat bizarre – you are penalising your customers with bad marks against their credit file if they move home if this is the case.
All I am asking for you to do is to remove this from my credit file – I have done and followed instructions by changing my address when I moved, so why should I be penalised?
My last complaint is the poor customer service, the attitude and the incompetence of a member of staff who works in your Collections Department called Deepa Maisuria.
I called the Collections Department on 19/01/2010 to pay off the loan and clear it all, as explained earlier this was because I do not want to have dealings with you anymore.
I spoke to Deepa and she advised me that all calls are recorded and then I explained that I want a settlement figure as I am paying this loan off – she said it to me and I asked if she could call me back, to which she agreed.
She rang me back and I said I need about half an hour so if she could call me back, that would be fine? Her exact words to me are, “This is affecting your credit file, it’s no loss to us as a bank as we can simply default the account and take it to a debt collection agency... how will you be paying, by credit or debit card?” Much to my shock at the way I had just been spoken to, I advised her that I would simply need another half an hour then the whole loan will be paid off. She said, “You need to pay this now...” I then explained about the previous problems I have been having with Natwest and her attitude was terrible. She looked through the loan account and said, “Its all your fault Mr Patel, its nobody’s fault here.”
I then asked her as to why no-one had written to me with regards to this information and as to why the loan was in arrears. She told me that all my mailings from the bank had been redirected back to branch from 17th November 2009. I asked her why no-one had told me about this and queried what is the point of you taking customers addresses and contact details. Her response was, “No-one here has the time to sit down and look at all these accounts, you need to pay now anyway.”
Not quite sure if you give commission or bonuses to members of staff who take payments from customers, but her whole mannerism, her attitude and her tone of voice is poor. I work in the Customer Service industry myself and I would never ever get away with speaking to customers like the way she spoke to me. She also advised me at the start of the call that all calls are recorded... I am asking you please (for her benefit, not mine) if you can listen into the call and address her on her customer service skills and maybe send her back for retraining or refresher training in order for her attitude to improve greatly. I won’t go into great detail on this as I am sure you will hear from the phone call, but blaming the Royal Mail Postal System or blaming my neighbours taking my mail away from me as to why I never got my statements from June 2009 (when I changed my address) to November 2009 is something that she cannot really comment on.
I would like to refer to your banking code that I have found on your website.
You state the following:
· We will help you use your account or service by sending you regular statements
(where appropriate) and we will keep you informed about changes to the interest rates,
charges or terms and conditions.
This has not been followed. You have NOT sent me regular statements, you have not kept me informed of any changes to interest rates, any charges that have been applied to my account and you have not informed me that my loan was in arrears and therefore making my credit report being viewed to other possible lenders as poor. I followed your instructions given to me on this website: http://www.natwest.com/personal/current-accounts/g4/common-questions.ashx#change_address
and this has not happened.
You also state:
· We will deal quickly and sympathetically with things that go wrong and consider all cases
of financial difficulty sympathetically and positively.
When things went wrong at the start of the loan, your advisors did deal quickly by refunding me of any charges that were done, but this doesn’t seem to have helped the matter as wrong information was given to me and this then caused the loan to turn into arrears. You have also not followed this in the way your member of staff spoke to me on the phone. I advised her I could not pay at that moment in time... threatening to default the account and taking the account to a debt collection agency is not dealing with the case sympathetically and positively. Blaming the Royal Mail postage system and even my neighbours is far from being positive. Giving the credit reference agencies wrong information which hinders my credit report from other people is not dealing with something quickly and sympathetically.
· We will publicise this Code, have copies available and make sure that our staff are trained
to put it into practice.
I have to say some members of your staff are not trained to put this banking code into practise.
I am now happy to say that my business with Natwest is nearly completed, and with the service that you have given to me in the past 12 months, I will never be returning.
My father and mother have business accounts with you, and I will be advising them to take their business elsewhere. You have also been treating them poorly and unfairly and as I type this letter, they are in the process of changing banks because of the poor service I have received, as well as them.
I would please ask you, as a business to investigate the matters mentioned in this letter. I would please ask for a refund of the charges made to my account and any charges that were made in error to the loan account.
If I cannot come to a suitable arrangement from this, I will be contacting the Financial Ombudsman Service and my local Consumer Advice Bureau and will be taking this matter further.
Yours Faithfully
0
Comments
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I would suggest shortening this - I will have a crack later this evening if you'd like.0
-
I don't want to appear rude but it I was dealing with your complaint I would be losing the will to live by the time I got half way through a letter like that.
Many years ago I wrote an article for Which? and made the point that you should be specific about your complaint so that whoever receives it can easily identify the problem.
If you simply ramble on, then you will probably get a very generalised apology but no real remedy because the reader is unable to diagnose the problem.
A complaint handler is not interested in what you tell your family. He or she simply wants to know what you think the problem is and, if possible, any evidence you have to support your view.
They will then either agree with you and make a proposal to put it right or explain why they do not - and if you can go to the Financial Ombudsman Service0 -
I don't know too much about this but I do agree that the letter is long. My real point however is that banks are absolutely laws unto themselves. I have problems with my bank and cannot get anyone to even speak in a civil tone to me. Call centres are a nightmare and they will not let me speak to the decision makers.
Anyway good luck BuffnessIn the red at LBM £25,703 on 20/01/10Debt as at 20/07/10 £25012Target debt free date 05/01/14Crazy Clothes Challenger 139 = 8/100PROUD TO BE DEALING WITH MY DEBT0 -
i have sent several letters to natwest about a loan that I had of 10,000 and £2000.00 left to pay. I ran up an overdraft of 3500.00 trying to pay this debt off after a divorce and losing everything I had. I now earn a lowly £15,000. I have consistently offered natwest £100 per month to pay off the loan but want to discuss the overdraft repayment as I never asked for the high an overdraft and as they would not deal on the loand payment, the overdraft was used to help keep up payments on the loan untill I lost my job. I was put into hardship but informed them I was now working 3 months ago and wanted to start paying 100 off the loan. They have now put me into recovery with Triton. I wrote to Triton informing them I had an appointment with CAB and sent them a copy of origianal letter to Nat west and my appointment letter with CAB.
I received ANOTHER letter today from Triton (3rd Nove) asking me to contact them. I am sooooooo mad. I just spoke to someone who said they wanted to go through my finances and see what i could pay. I told them I had ALREADY done this with Nat West and offered to pay 100 per month which Nat West would not accept and I was not prepared to do anything untill I have spoken to the CAB.
Triton informed me the phone calls would continue untill I came to an arrangement to pay them and go through my finances with THEM.
What more can I do?? I can even afford the 100 per month on my salary of 15000 after rent and outgoings but a family member offered to help.
What shall I do?? Any suggestions?? I might add I was a loyal customer of NatWest for 25 years and used to pay thousands into their my account. Now I have nothing I am being harassed by Triton.0 -
the banks dont give a sh*t0
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angry_tiger wrote: »i have sent several letters to natwest about a loan that I had of 10,000 and £2000.00 left to pay. I ran up an overdraft of 3500.00 trying to pay this debt off after a divorce and losing everything I had. I now earn a lowly £15,000. I have consistently offered natwest £100 per month to pay off the loan but want to discuss the overdraft repayment as I never asked for the high an overdraft and as they would not deal on the loand payment, the overdraft was used to help keep up payments on the loan untill I lost my job. I was put into hardship but informed them I was now working 3 months ago and wanted to start paying 100 off the loan. They have now put me into recovery with Triton. I wrote to Triton informing them I had an appointment with CAB and sent them a copy of origianal letter to Nat west and my appointment letter with CAB.
I received ANOTHER letter today from Triton (3rd Nove) asking me to contact them. I am sooooooo mad. I just spoke to someone who said they wanted to go through my finances and see what i could pay. I told them I had ALREADY done this with Nat West and offered to pay 100 per month which Nat West would not accept and I was not prepared to do anything untill I have spoken to the CAB.
Triton informed me the phone calls would continue untill I came to an arrangement to pay them and go through my finances with THEM.
What more can I do?? I can even afford the 100 per month on my salary of 15000 after rent and outgoings but a family member offered to help.
What shall I do?? Any suggestions?? I might add I was a loyal customer of NatWest for 25 years and used to pay thousands into their my account. Now I have nothing I am being harassed by Triton.
Triton are part of RBS Group who own Natwest. I suggest that you send them a letter to state that you only wish to communicate by post. (I think if you have a look at the CAG website there is a template letter there)Best Regards
zppp
0 -
Hey guys,
Just wandering if someone can shed some light on this.
I have been treated SO badly with Natwest - instead of me explaining whats gone on, I will copy and paste the letter I have sent to them.
I just wanted to make them aware of the problems that they can cause customers, and if they do something about it then great, if not then all is not lost.
What you guys think?
Sorry guys, its quite long!
Dear Sir/Madam,
...
Yours Faithfully
You should definitely write to them if it makes you feel better, it's cathartic to get things off your chest.
You'll probably get a polite generic reply, but I'm afraid I doubt your letter will actually make it past the lowly admin clerk that opens it before logging and filing it. They're are multi-billion dollar corporations; they have the money, they make the rules. They don't care what little Johnny or Janey think of their service. But they'll pay lip service to your complaint.
Good luck.0
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