Metro bank - new customer review

Dr_Cuckoo3

alanq wrote: »

I opened a current account. One hour waiting for an agent to become free. I can see why they provide toilets for customer use - they need them if they take up all the offers of drinks while they wait.

Printer wasn't working so everything had to be written out by hand. Surely a BRANCH (I refuse to call it a store) should have more than one printer. Account opening seemed efficient enough otherwise. As I didn't have photo ID I was informed that I could not have my card issued on the spot. It would have to be posted. I expected the card within the next couple of days but instead the PIN arrived a few days later and the card after a week. The letter with the card said that before I could use it I would have to activate it either by phone or by revisiting a [BRANCH] .

On arriving the greeter informed me that if I had a PIN that was all I needed as the card was already active. I told him this was contrary to what the letter said but tried to check my balance at an ATM to humour him. "Unauthorised Transaction Attempted". Went to the counter and made a small deposit and asked the teller to activate my card. "All done". I went to the ATM again the card was still not active. Returned to the same teller. Puzzled teller offered no explanation nor apology for not doing as I had requested. Asked to try the card in the ATM again so that she knew all was OK. It was OK which was just as well because in the minute it took me to do the requested check she had disappeared.

I had read here bad reports of Metrobank online banking. It doesn't seem that bad although I have lost my connection once. Beginner's luck?

Nothing about Metrobank says to me that it is providing a superior customer service experience to that of other High Street banks. I opened the account despite the gimmicks not because of them.

Did they manage to get anything right ?

What about the £3 offered on new accounts ?


Have you attempted to send a faster payment to or from the account yet ?

Dr_Cuckoo3

Metro Bank are "doing all they can to reduce the waiting times"

alanq

Dr_Cuckoo3 wrote: »

What about the £3 offered on new accounts ?

Yes I got the £3 "for a coffee". I also got a couple of free coffees while I waited.

Dr_Cuckoo3 wrote: »

Have you attempted to send a faster payment to or from the account yet ?

I have sent £1 payments into and out of the account to check that I have the correct details set up. I did not immediately check for success so I don't know how long they took to arrive.

Doc_N

Metro_Bank_Representative wrote: »

Faster payments from all banks can take up to 24 hours. All banks that are part of the Faster Payments scheme confirm on their websites that the payment will usually arrive on the same day, and that some payments will be available more quickly than others.

Thanks. Faster Payments can theoretically take up to 24 hours - but that's the longest time allowed by law. In reality, pretty well every bank (apart from Metro Bank) manages to do it within a few seconds.

Why, exactly, can't Metro Bank manage to do what all the other banks have been doing for years? Why does Metro Bank take hours to achieve something the others manage in seconds?

For me, this makes Metro Bank pretty much unusable - and I can't be alone in that view.

Dr_Cuckoo3

Doc_N wrote: »

Thanks. Faster Payments can theoretically take up to 24 hours - but that's the longest time allowed by law. In reality, pretty well every bank (apart from Metro Bank) manages to do it within a few seconds.

Why, exactly, can't Metro Bank manage to do what all the other banks have been doing for years? Why does Metro Bank take hours to achieve something the others manage in seconds?

For me, this makes Metro Bank pretty much unusable - and I can't be alone in that view.

It appears that you believe that Metro Bank is technically unable to send and receive faster payments within seconds.

Metro Bank is able to send and receive faster payments within seconds , but chooses not to do so.

To give the example of receiving faster payments the "payment outcome" screen of the sending bank confirms that the receiving bank has "acknowledged" or "accepted" the payment at the time it was sent.

Metro Bank take an hour to update the balance.

I think it is cheaper to do it this way,






There is no good reason to delay making incoming payments available - it is the bank's choice to do so.

Doc_N

Dr_Cuckoo3 wrote: »

It appears that you believe that Metro Bank is technically unable to send and receive faster payments within seconds.

Metro Bank is able to send and receive faster payments within seconds , but chooses not to do so. Metro Bank take an hour to update the balance. I think it is cheaper to do it this way,

There is no good reason to delay making incoming payments available - it is the bank's choice to do so.

I'm sure you're right. Metro seems to do everything on the cheap, and I'm guessing they don't really have the resources to operate a bank in the way most people would expect it to be run. A free cup of coffee seems to appease some people - and that probably saves them a fortune!

I want a bank that works, and a bank that I can trust. That bank, sadly, is not Metro Bank.

Metro_Bank_Representative

alanq wrote: »

That is not information that I am prepared to entrust to an email. I am willing to send a secure message if that is acceptable.

That would be great. Thank you very much.

alanq

Metro_Bank_Representative wrote: »

That would be great. Thank you very much.

Secure message just sent.

eagleeye

It's not only metrobank but other small banks like pnb,sbi,etc where payment can take up to 12-24 hours to reach into their account.I also heard that few banks like sbi ,pnb have been allocated only 3-5 slots per day to run the fp cycle.SBI uk can transfer money to any bank account in india with in 10 minutes but to uk account they take ages.

silvercar

I'm going to sing the praises of metro bank. Had 2 debit cards made today (bank holiday) within 10 minutes of ordering.

Well pleased.