MSE News: Metro Bank to launch in April 22 February 2010 at 4:44PM in Budgeting & Bank Accounts 13 replies 3.5K views

Former_MSE_Guy

This is the discussion thread for the following MSE news story:

"A new entrant in the UK's high street banking sector today confirmed plans to open its first branches by April ..."

Read the full story:
Metro Bank to launch in April

Lokolo

Hm. I wonder how they are going to afford 8-8 and weekend opening hours etc.

Would be interested to see what they are going to be offering.

wizk1

Lokolo wrote: »

Hm. I wonder how they are going to afford 8-8 and weekend opening hours etc.

Would be interested to see what they are going to be offering.

They'll be pretty good at first, then once they've hooked enough people in, it'll be chod! Just like Santander is doing at the moment. These deals don't last forever.

Consumerist

I seem to remember reading somwhere that they will not be offering internet banking. With a limited branch network to start with, I don't see many moneysavers getting involved for quite a while.
.

jambosans

Seems a novelty idea designed to appeal to those with a traditionalist view of banking - i.e. good branch service.

I would much rather see a new internet only bank, with the operating cost savings passed on through higher interest rates directly to customers. Who cares about being able to take a dump in their local branch (although I'm sure plenty of disgruntled MSE'ers would relish that chance - minus the toilet :rotfl:)?

Good customer service is not provided by some jumped up sales person pretending to be a fully qualified banking expert in a branch. Perhaps Metro Bank will prove me wrong, I doubt it however, as I see it: excessive branch opening hours + toilets (and toilet cleaners) = rubbish product range and/ or poorly trained, low paid, branch staff.

sav_c

jambosans wrote: »

Seems a novelty idea designed to appeal to those with a traditionalist view of banking - i.e. good branch service.

I would much rather see a new internet only bank, with the operating cost savings passed on through higher interest rates directly to customers. Who cares about being able to take a dump in their local branch (although I'm sure plenty of disgruntled MSE'ers would relish that chance - minus the toilet :rotfl:)?

Good customer service is not provided by some jumped up sales person pretending to be a fully qualified banking expert in a branch. Perhaps Metro Bank will prove me wrong, I doubt it however, as I see it: excessive branch opening hours + toilets (and toilet cleaners) = rubbish product range and/ or poorly trained, low paid, branch staff.

surely an oxymoron? I can't remember ever speaking to a banking expert in a branch since I opened a bank account for the first time 22 years ago.

I welcome Metro Bank if it's going to be different. Anything has to be better than what we have at present.

It's a shame they won't have an internet banking side though.

jambosans

sav_c wrote: »

surely an oxymoron? I can't remember ever speaking to a banking expert in a branch since I opened a bank account for the first time 22 years ago.

Yes, the sentence makes that fairly clear. Apologies if your question is ironically rhetorical.

premierfella

Consumerist wrote: »

I seem to remember reading somwhere that they will not be offering internet banking. With a limited branch network to start with, I don't see many moneysavers getting involved for quite a while.
.

Re: internet and telephone banking, it may have been this FT article (website indicates 17th February):
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/d2cd4d06-1bf6-11df-a5e1-00144feab49a.html

I looked it up only because my recollection was different - I had read in December that they planned both at that stage. It seems that these were either an aspiration or was subsequently dropped.

JuicyJesus

The article says that Metro Bank don't have a banking license, which may be something of an impediment to them wanting to be a bank.

Dr_Cuckoo3

The Metro Bank website is now up and running :T

metrobankonline.co.uk

They claim that they will have "Great Online Banking"

Lets hope the webpage stays the same size when navigating between pages as the current website's pages shrink when clicking on links :eek:

In addition most of the information about the bank seems to be located on newspaper and TV news websites simply linked to from the Metro Bank website

Great online banking - I doubt that they will accept online applications

Faster payments - I doubt it

But they do have someone wearing a silly costume and coin counting machines which will no doubt compensate for any shortcomings

Alpine_Star

jambosans wrote: »

Seems a novelty idea designed to appeal to those with a traditionalist view of banking - i.e. good branch service.

So good branch service is a novelty these days. I couldn't agree more.