CH: Online banking for charity accounts

BusyLizzie_3

I've recently become the treasurer for the pre-school that two of my children attend. We currently bank with Barclays but have found their service slow and unhelpful and think we should be able to get a better rate of interest on our savings account elsewhere. I have three children aged three and under and find it difficult to get to my nearest branch of Barclays to pay in cheques, etc so we would ideally like an account where we could pay in at a PO. I also would like to be able to view our accounts online, but not make payments or transfers online (Barclays cannot offer a read-only online banking service).

Does anyone have any ideas for accounts - or are we asking the impossible?

Many thanks

Savvy_Sue

BusyLizzie wrote:

I've recently become the treasurer for the pre-school that two of my children attend. We currently bank with Barclays but have found their service slow and unhelpful and think we should be able to get a better rate of interest on our savings account elsewhere. I have three children aged three and under and find it difficult to get to my nearest branch of Barclays to pay in cheques, etc so we would ideally like an account where we could pay in at a PO. I also would like to be able to view our accounts online, but not make payments or transfers online (Barclays cannot offer a read-only online banking service).

Does anyone have any ideas for accounts - or are we asking the impossible?

Many thanks

If you are a registered charity then Unity Trust do what you want, but I don't know if they offer accounts to non-charities. Actually you post your deposits off to them but presumably that's no problem. If you need to pay CASH in or withdraw CASH then you'd need to nominate a local bank branch at which to do this, which can take a while, but it does work eventually!

When I was doing what you're doing I always used to use Alliance and Leicester. If they are still doing a Clubs and Societies Account this operates via the post office. I never used online banking with them, but their phone system was OK, and transfers by phone from High Interest Deposit Account to Current Account were immediate. I could check balances and listen to a statement as well.

I suppose the Barclays argument against offering a view only online facility is that two people have to be involved in making any online transaction valid (please tell me that's the case! - it is with Unity!) so you can view but unless someone authorises a transaction it won't happen, so it's not a problem. I hope that makes sense, it's a bit late ...

BusyLizzie_3

Thank you Sue for your very helpful advice. Yes, we are a registered charity. Alliance and Leicester is looking very promising - I will look into that further. There is a PO at the end of my street and I imagine most people are likely to live nearer a PO than a bank!

Barclays are happy to offer us online banking - but there is no facility to 'view only'. I can't (and don't want to be in the position of being able to) make payments or transfers on my own as the account has two other signatories. I just wanted a simple way of being able to track our balances - I've never used telephone banking before but have a feeling I'm about to start!

Thank you again for your help.

Savvy_Sue

BusyLizzie wrote:

Barclays are happy to offer us online banking - but there is no facility to 'view only'. I can't (and don't want to be in the position of being able to) make payments or transfers on my own as the account has two other signatories.

I'm shocked if the Barclays online banking system has no 'dual authority' system in place for accounts which need two signatures. I know the Unity Trust one does: one person 'submits' a payment, but a different person has to 'authorise' it before it goes through! Very worrying - not that I'm suggesting you'd do anything wrong, but you're right not to want the possibility of doing anything wrong!

ronnie_2

Another option for you i can recommend would be the Lloydstsb club & charities account, you can like the a&l make deposits at any postoffice

They can give you online banking however its not widely known by staff in the branches, but if they open it on a old lloyds sortcode and treat it as a business account they can open online banking;)

Also the Lloydstsb charity dept has a 0845 number and is answered by one or two people (uk based:D ) who can transfer funds or give you information on the account. Quite nice speaking to same people on a regular basis:T