Avoid First Direct - They are gonna charge all customers £10!

EagerLearner

Join the Make Money From Nothing Challenge here on MSE - I'm £160 richer

peter999

SparciaM wrote:

To Eager_Learner and others who are going to open a savings acc or CC and never use them. BEWARE. I've called FD on 3 different occasions to sort out 3 different problems and on every call I was told.

Call 1: You need to regularly save money in your sav or you'll be liable for charge - but never mentioned use of CC.

Call 2: You need to use the CC and sav acc every month to not pay the charge.

Call 3: You need to spend £10 a month on the CC and sav a regular amount every month not to pay the charge.

It seems like FD are telling people what they want to get them to open accounts and when they realise they have dormant CC, Sav acc's etc they'll surely crack down on those people next.

Their website does not put any conditions on holding of an additional product to avoid charges.

Web page has been saved as proof.

Yes, on the phone they may be trying to discourage/stop people opening sleeper accounts that may not be used.

Of course they may change terms/conditions in future with another start date, but there's only so many customers you can lose !!
.

EagerLearner

I understand folks having to leave out of principle, but I've got enough going on at the mo without the stress so will be biding my time.

If FD get difficult or the service goes sour then of course I will leave, for now though once the mass exodus has happened and the dust settles, I will see what FD do. It will never be 'too late' to close my account, by then the rush into other banks will have calmed down etc so I have nothing to lose by waiting - FD have already told me I won't get charged so I will review the accounts in 6 months time.

SparciaM

How long do FD take to reply to online messages? I sent an instruct us message 6 days ago and still no reply or anything.

MORPH3US

I really don't understand all the people who say "the great service we get from FD justifies the £10 charge"?!?!

Personally I don't like their online banking. It is dark and unattractive and difficult to use.

Their phone banking is supposed to be good but I never use phone banking and never will. Whats the point if you have internet banking?!?!

What else are they great at that justifies £10 a month?!?!

I am with Nationwide and their internet banking is great. Nationwide will not charge for their accounts so for me they are top!!!

M

peter999

MORPH3US wrote:

I really don't understand all the people who say "the great service we get from FD justifies the £10 charge"?!?!

Personally I don't like their online banking. It is dark and unattractive and difficult to use.

What else are they great at that justifies £10 a month?!?!

I am with Nationwide and their internet banking is great. Nationwide will not charge for their accounts so for me they are top!!!

No company should get too cocky with its customers.
I agree with you regarding FD banking interface being old & unimaginative.

As you say, many people deal with their bank via internet & may see little difference between the banks out there.

First Direct started years ago with a big fanfare of being telephone banking only.
Now all banks have this & the internet has now moved in bigtime.

Maybe it's curtains for First Direct !!

peter999

Ps: let's get a rumour going, that put's the frighteners up FD.

fallen121

I agree that there's little to differentiate FD from most of the other Banks these days - and their interest rates are pants.

My husband joined them when they first started because his local branch of Midland had closed and as he was due to go to University in Scotland, his only other option was to open an account with a Scottish Bank. With FD his actual geographic location was fairly irrelevant. He raved about the customer service and that was what pursuaded me to join in the end.

The only thing I really value about FD is that compared to other Banks theirs is the only one where you can still speak to a real person without having to negotiate a maze of automated voice systems. But since the internet banking came in I haven't used the telephone service in about 5 years.

I made extensive use of the text message alerts until they started charging for them and in general I have no complaints about FD's service. But I do object to being told that they want to charge customers 'to continue to provide excellent service'. Providing good service should be a Banks' priority as a matter of course, and customers shouldn't have to pay extra for it.

My husband has a Business account at the Royal and pays monthly charges which we do not object to - after all, it is a Business account. And for most Banks, the charges paid by Business accounts help to offset to some extent the free personal accounts enjoyed by the rest of the branch customers. That is the way it has always been in the High Street since the advent of free personal Banking. But First Direct doesn't have any Business customers that I know of, so maybe this is why we are having to pay....?

The final point about all this which annoys me intensely is how the charges are going to hit among others the retired, women on maternity leave and people in part time employment. Meantime the wealthy once again avoid the tedious chore of having to ensure they meet the income criteria and/or have adequate activity on their credit card/ savings account of whatever. It is all very well coming up with grand ideas for avoiding the charges, but these take time to administer. And if you work a 50 hour week there's only so much time in the day.

Technology has made things easy for the Banks. Customers now carry out many of the tedious account admin tasks which once the Banks had to employ staff to carry out. However, not content with this, FD wants to impose even more tedious t&cs on the continuation of 'free' banking, and it will be up to the customer to figure out if they have met the income criteria for the month, and if not, the charge will be automatically applied. This introduces all sorts of interesting issue such as the definition of a calendar month and what happens when a customer is paid late because the end of the week co-incides with a weekend. Customer against computer. I can't wait.

CopperPlate_2

As far as I can gather a calendar month is just that - from the 1st to the 30th or whatever. In my own experience I have always been paid early when the last day of a month has fallen on a weekend.

fallen121

CopperPlate wrote:

As far as I can gather a calendar month is just that - from the 1st to the 30th or whatever.

If this is indeed the case, then why do First Direct run their monthly interest periods to the 19th of the month and pay the interest on the 20th of the month......?

Citibank are another example of a Bank where the term 'calendar month' is open to somewhat more liberal interpretation when it comes to the application of interest and charges.

Customers paying in cheques are going to have an even more interesting time, as if the funds don't clear within the defined period they may be deemed to have not met the deposit requirements.

fallen121

CopperPlate wrote:

In my own experience I have always been paid early when the last day of a month has fallen on a weekend.

Presumably that is because you are paid monthly, as opposed to being paid on a four weekly cycle.