should unused accounts be closed?

LongTermLurker

fenwick458 wrote: »

yes, close all unused accounts .

i made the mistake of leaving my alliance and leicester account open and eneded up getting charged £165 in fees. they wouldn't let me close it straight away because there was charges due to come out at the end of the month, but by the time the charge came out a new charge had gone on and i would go overdrawn and get charged more again. took 2 months to get it closed in the end, i'm sure they are not allowed to do this but i just though whatever and shut the account and got over it as they had already paid £125 just for joining.

Unless I've misunderstood you, if you wanted to close today and there were charges outstanding, of course they're allowed to stop you closing it - a closed account means they can no longer hold you to the money. I suspect you could have closed the account immediately if you'd paid all charges due?

adindas

With A&L Premier Direct Account (PDCA), is different
I believe many will agree that with A&L PDCA you should have closed it as soon as 1 year have passed, that was what I did. Just one call will do to close the a/c so it is very straight forward.

Good Reason to close.
You need to maintain £500 each month, although the interest rate already dropped significantly after 1 year have passed. If you did not you will pay penalty fee.

But like LongTermLurker was saying, if there were outstanding charges every bank will stop you closing your a/c until you pay your outstanding balance.

But here we are recommending to keep the current a/c open in case:
- No dormancy fee
- No minimum funding requirements.
- No monthly fee

This is normally the case in the a/c which was opened back few years ago. So if you have this kind of a/c keep it, it is a privilege. Nowadays is becoming harder and harder to get this kind of a/c.

ADINDAS

fenwick458 wrote: »

yes, close all unused accounts .

i made the mistake of leaving my alliance and leicester account open and eneded up getting charged £165 in fees. they wouldn't let me close it straight away because there was charges due to come out at the end of the month, but by the time the charge came out a new charge had gone on and i would go overdrawn and get charged more again. took 2 months to get it closed in the end, i'm sure they are not allowed to do this but i just though whatever and shut the account and got over it as they had already paid £125 just for joining.

fenwick458

LongTermLurker wrote: »

Unless I've misunderstood you, if you wanted to close today and there were charges outstanding, of course they're allowed to stop you closing it - a closed account means they can no longer hold you to the money. I suspect you could have closed the account immediately if you'd paid all charges due?

no, they wouldn't let me close the account, even though i had creditied the account with enough money to cover the charges coming out. heres the whole story...

i used to use the account for about a year, then i stopped using it and about month later (mid august) i got charged £5 under funding fee, and as a result went overdrawn and was due to be charged £50 at the end of the month.
immediately transferred £55 into the account and phoned up and told them to close it. they said i had to wait untill the money came out at the end of the month.
phoned up at the end of the month (august) and told them to close it again, they said ok but because i had not used the aco!!!! much recently i could not answer any of the secuity questions so i would have to go into a branch and show id to close it, and was told any charges put on between now and then would be cancelled.
week later i go in to try and close it, but they now say i owe them £105 as i had been hit with another £5 under funding fee and subsequently was due to be charged £100 for going overdrawn at the end of the month. at the time i was :mad: and mentioned i had already tried to close it, telephone banking person had said the charges would be cancelled but they were having none of it and said because it was an A&L account they can't do anything about the charges. so i reluctantly paid more money into the account and told them to close it again, but they said they would have to wait untill the end of the month when the money came out to close it!
end of the month (september) and i phone up, tell them to close it and they said they would, and i would not be charged anymore money.
a week later i log onto internet banking and see it's still open, so phone up and question this they said it is in the process of being closed it takes a while....
a week after that i log onto internet banking and it's still open, and i see they have put another charge on my account (£10 for going overdrawn??) so i phone up immediately and shouted at them alot, this must have got my point accross because a few days later i received a letter confirming the closure and a cheque for 3pence.

adindas

Dear fenwick458

I think your case is nothing to do with whether to close or keep open the unused a/c. This is something to do with bad and incompetent customer services of A&L and now Santander.

A lot of people in this forum have complained about how bad the Santander is especially those behind the telephone. I have experienced it by my selves I sometime get someone who knows what he is doing, sometimes I get a person who actually have no knowledge at all.

But this is not just about closing bank a/c it could happen to other complaint such as unfair overdraft charges, try to close your active a/c (not juts unused a/c) etc.

You are right (this is based on my own experience) I have lost trust with Santander Customer Service. For that reason if I have a dispute, I always try to call several different people including visiting their branch try to note their name so I could refer it any time.

But I believe your experience is irrelevant with the decision to close or to keep the a/c open as it could happen to any other bank product with similar bank. Please Correct me if I am wrong.

ADINDAS

fenwick458 wrote: »

no, they wouldn't let me close the account, even though i had creditied the account with enough money to cover the charges coming out. heres the whole story...

i used to use the account for about a year, then i stopped using it and about month later (mid august) i got charged £5 under funding fee, and as a result went overdrawn and was due to be charged £50 at the end of the month.
immediately transferred £55 into the account and phoned up and told them to close it. they said i had to wait untill the money came out at the end of the month.
phoned up at the end of the month (august) and told them to close it again, they said ok but because i had not used the aco!!!! much recently i could not answer any of the secuity questions so i would have to go into a branch and show id to close it, and was told any charges put on between now and then would be cancelled.
week later i go in to try and close it, but they now say i owe them £105 as i had been hit with another £5 under funding fee and subsequently was due to be charged £100 for going overdrawn at the end of the month. at the time i was :mad: and mentioned i had already tried to close it, telephone banking person had said the charges would be cancelled but they were having none of it and said because it was an A&L account they can't do anything about the charges. so i reluctantly paid more money into the account and told them to close it again, but they said they would have to wait untill the end of the month when the money came out to close it!
end of the month (september) and i phone up, tell them to close it and they said they would, and i would not be charged anymore money.
a week later i log onto internet banking and see it's still open, so phone up and question this they said it is in the process of being closed it takes a while....
a week after that i log onto internet banking and it's still open, and i see they have put another charge on my account (£10 for going overdrawn??) so i phone up immediately and shouted at them alot, this must have got my point accross because a few days later i received a letter confirming the closure and a cheque for 3pence.

LongTermLurker

adindas wrote: »

But I believe your experience is irrelevant with the decision to close or to keep the a/c open as it could happen to any other bank product with similar bank. Please Correct me if I am wrong.

ADINDAS

I almost think he has a point. I think his point was to close accounts immediately you stop using them. In his case, if he'd done that, he wouldn't have been charged any underfunding fees.

However, you (Adindas) are right in that the failure of Santander/A&L to act on his instructions isn't related to closing accounts or not.

I think the real answer is that if you have an account that requires funding, you must make sure you either keep funding it or close it. If you have one that doesn't need funding, then it makes sense to keep it as a pawn when playing the switching-for-money game.