'Which is the worst customer service bank?' poll discussion

Whitemonk

With all this bad feedback regarding Santander, I'm surprised that Martin hasn't nentioned it in his weekly newsletter. Only a few weeks ago, I took up their ISA deal for existing customers that was mentioned on his website. THEN I found this thread.

KevinTaylor66

Have a look at National Complaints Day .com - it seems really good and you can get help from Which and the Financial Ombadsman service for free.

raeoni

I would just like to defend a&l/santander since it appears they are getting a really serious bashing...

Don't get me wrong i sympathise completely with the people who have experienced difficulty since the change over, but for me personally, it has not affected my banking experience at all. I was kept informed by post of the changes occuring, my internet banking site has not experienced any problems at all and in the 3 occurences where i have needed to phone them up, i have had no trouble getting through to somebody.

Maybe they have decided that i deserve to get treated better than every other person who has an account with them, if so i am very glad about that, but ultimately have you noticed that people rarely post comments on these forums that are positive - it's always a complaint.

So people who are considering a move to a&l/santander, this may be the one good post you will see but at least you are getting both sides of the story.

I_hate_santander

I used to have an online business account with Abbey. Following a mistake by them, they were not willing to help. It was like one of these training videos that John Cleese made years ago, showing how awful customer service could be.

Eventually, after the help of the fin ser ombudsman, we got our own money back and closed the account.

A few years down the line, following the takeover of A & L and Brad & Bing, guess what?..... they have lost one of the accounts. Watch this space.

Marks out of 100 for communication?.....0.

angel_islington

raeoni wrote: »

I would just like to defend a&l/santander since it appears they are getting a really serious bashing...

Don't get me wrong i sympathise completely with the people who have experienced difficulty since the change over, but for me personally, it has not affected my banking experience at all. I was kept informed by post of the changes occuring, my internet banking site has not experienced any problems at all and in the 3 occurences where i have needed to phone them up, i have had no trouble getting through to somebody.

Maybe they have decided that i deserve to get treated better than every other person who has an account with them, if so i am very glad about that, but ultimately have you noticed that people rarely post comments on these forums that are positive - it's always a complaint.

So people who are considering a move to a&l/santander, this may be the one good post you will see but at least you are getting both sides of the story.

*faints*

Obviously, you are right and more often than not people will post when something goes wrong and rarely when something goes right. However, it's the sheer amount of people complaining that must say something is seriously wrong with Santander. Weirdly in Spain they are seen as having very good customer service.

It's not just the amount of complaints that is shocking, it's what is happening to these people. People who have had large amounts of money lost in the transfers from A&L, people who have had fraudulent activity on their account only to be told that they will have to pay the money back, I could go on and on and on.

scott_lithgows

I_hate_santander wrote: »

I used to have an online business account with Abbey. Following a mistake by them, they were not willing to help. It was like one of these training videos that John Cleese made years ago, showing how awful customer service could be.

Eventually, after the help of the fin ser ombudsman, we got our own money back and closed the account.

A few years down the line, following the takeover of A & L and Brad & Bing, guess what?..... they have lost one of the accounts. Watch this space.

Marks out of 100 for communication?.....0.

Best new user name on here for a while.Welcome to the anti-santander club.

make-do=and-mend_2

scott_lithgows wrote: »

RIP
National & Provincial Building Society
Bradford & Bingley Building Society

Ahh.. the N&P, what a wonderful Building Society they were!

Left the Midland Bank many years ago (didn't hit it off with the Manager at our local branch) and took my overdraft to Williams & Glyns who were great until they became Royal Bank of Scotland. Mistakes started appearing on statements, managers and mortgage advisors disappeared from local branches and everything became very impersonal. If you wanted a loan, they could only agree subject to the application being sent to Head Office for approval - my daughter was offered a mortgage by her local branch and then it was refused by some faceless beaurocrat in another office who'd never met her and had no knowledge of her circumstances. Moved to Nationwide five years ago and it is lovely to have the personal touch again. No complaints. Have savings bonds dotted about with other financial institutions (as per Martin's advice), and can recommend Cheshire BS, Coventry BS, Saga, Cheltenham Gloucester BS, Birmingham & Midshires BS and Woolwich BS. All have given good service, even when taking money out to re-invest elsewhere.

Would also like to give the Co-op Bank a thumbs-up - they have looked after my mother's account since 1947!

:wave::wave::wave::hello::hello::hello::j:j:j

I_luv_cats

1/10 My score Santander -My old fashioned friend has a Santander passbook account and the queues for the cashiers are very long most days!! You can wait around an hour to get served. Also they have to take enquiries as no enqiury desk, which slows the cashiers down!!!

1/10 My score Santander - I opened an Isa last year and they set up two accounts with log ins all jumbled up!! I had to try different combinations to log in first off!!
Recently I switched to a higher interest rate account - I've had no word that I opened the account or that they are keeping my account details and just changing the issue number!! I had to phone up!!

9/10 My score CoOp - CoOp are normally 100% with polite helpful staff and accurate systems. They did make a series of mistakes with one transaction BUT it all got cleared up and compensation/goodwill was paid in the end!

GLEKA

I_hate_santander wrote: »

I used to have an online business account with Abbey. Following a mistake by them, they were not willing to help. It was like one of these training videos that John Cleese made years ago, showing how awful customer service could be.

Eventually, after the help of the fin ser ombudsman, we got our own money back and closed the account.

A few years down the line, following the takeover of A & L and Brad & Bing, guess what?..... they have lost one of the accounts. Watch this space.

Marks out of 100 for communication?.....0.

Somebody else with the same problem http://!!!!!!!.com/32yx5vg not sure if they are getting the online advice from FOS as part of the National Complaints Day event tomorrow?

justintime1_2

I have banked with HSBC (formerly Midland bank) for over 40 years with virtually no problems.
My daughter has an account with Santander and for inadvertently going overdrawn by £0.90 for one day was charged £25. On complaining, Santander hid behind the recent court ruling that bank charges were not penalties. My daughter is referring the matter to the Financial Ombudsman but my advice to others is to avoid Santander - they are clearly interested in profit at any cost, rather than long term customer relationships.