Santander - Major C***-up - Poor service.

Cmdr_Bond

Well, it has finally happened, I have run out of space to keep this entire story in one thread (more than 25,000 characters), so I have now put navigation in to each of my posts that are relevant to the ongoing complaint. Happy reading.

/!\ WARNING - LONG POST /!\

Original Post - 07:03 PM, Tuesday, 1st February, 2011

Today has been the first day in which I have seen a light at the end of the tunnel.

Let me explain. I am an identical twin, to make matters worse (or more confusing for some) mine and my brothers names are swapped round (I am ABC, he is BAC).

We both opened bank accounts with Abbey National many many years ago, between us we now have 4 bank accounts and 2 savings accounts with them (1 of my bank accounts is a joint account with my wife).

Last year (2010), around July/August my bro moved house. Around September/October he sorted out his change of address with Santander (yes, he should of done it sooner). The next statement I received said Mr BBC (remember I am ABC and he is BAC).

I logged on to my on-line banking, only to find I cannot change my personal details. Made the long distance call to India, to be told I had to go into a branch. So I dutifully made the journey into a branch to correct my name details on the account.

Within a week, me and my wife were round my brothers, and my wife noticed his latest statement also read Mr. BBC. We suggested he went into the same branch that I did to get this sorted. For some reason he did not. He went into his local branch, whose computers were down, so he went into a Santander Agency across the road.

He provided them with identification and details of his accounts. To make things absolutely clear I went into the same Agency the following day (with my wife), spoke to the same person my brother did, and also provided her with details of our accounts and our identification. (These included screen-shots from both mine and my brothers on-line banking log ons to show whose accounts belonged where).

This was November last year (2010). I have since received statements in the correct name, so thought it was all sorted - how wrong could I be.

In January this year (2011), I paid a cheque into my account (Xmas present). Whilst I paid mine in through a machine, my brother paid his in over the counter. It was here we found out all was still not well, as they had put all 6 accounts under his name. Yet we could still only manage our own accounts on-line.

I was now on the warpath, went phoned up the main branch that I originally went into, and demanded an appointment with the manager. I ended up with an appointment with an advisor (as they apparently have more access to the systems than a manager - a bit backwards if you ask me). I have to say, that I cannot fault the advisor one bit, in fact she has been VERY helpful.

She upscaled the issue to a full on complaint, advised me of the complaint's procedure blah blah blah. This was on the 14th of January (2011).

I received a confirmation letter from her (as did my brother), within a couple working of days, that this was now an official complaint, and it basically repeated what she had told me in the branch.

On the 18th or 19th of January (2011), I forget which, I was going through my statements on-line. I clicked to go to the next page and got a "this service is temporarily unavailable" message. I thought OK, technical glitch, these things happen and thought no more of it. Until yesterday (31st January (2011)) that is.

I tried logging on yesterday, and although the system accepted my credentials - under e-banking it still said that the service was unavailable. I phoned my brother, who checked his account, and was able to log in without issue and only his accounts were visible.

It was then I had a brain-ripple. I had TWO e-banking log ons. One for my first bank account and one for my joint account. I only ever used the joint one for the last few years as they had merged all my accounts so that I could see them from one login.

So I tried my other login - It worked - kind of. I had logged in and could see bank accounts - but they were not my accounts. Another phone call to my brother confirmed that under TWO SEPARATE LOGINS we could both see and worse transact on HIS accounts.

I had had enough, I phoned the branch at about 16:30 and asked to speak to either the advisor who had been dealing with this or the manager. The advisor was not in and the manager was nowhere to be found, but the person who answered the phone promised me that she would find the manager and get her to call me back before the branch closed (half an hour). At 16:55, I phoned back and got a different person, he went to get the manager and then came back to me and referred me to the complaints department saying that the manager had said that they (complaints department) had picked up the case on the 17th of January (2011). It was obvious to me that I was not going to get to speak to the manager, so I asked for the phone number for the complaints department, which I received, and asked if there was any reference or case number required, I was told no. BUT the complaint might be registered under my brothers name, because although it affected both of us, only his profile was available at the time the complaint was raised.

I was particularly furious now, as I had found out the complaints department had officially, even if not actually, been working on this case for 2 weeks - and yet neither myself or my brother had received any contact from them to say the matters were being resolved. I was also interested in the time scale, because this was either the day or two days before I lost my internet banking, which by the process of deduction led me to believe they actually HAD done SOMETHING.

I tested the phone number to make sure the department was still open, then phone my brother just in case they needed to speak to him. He was worried I might be on hold for a while, so told me to call back straight away and he would be over as soon as possible.

I phoned the complaints department, dealt with the automated robots and was on hold for a very short time before I got through to someone. I went through the security checks for my account only to be told there were no complaints listed against my account. I explained that it may be under my brothers account and that he was on his way. A minute or 2 later he came through the door and I handed him the phone. After he went through the security checks he was told he had FAILED, and that he would get a call back on his number (luckily a mobile) within 2 hours. By 21:00, this had not happened, so we resolved to march on the branch the following day (Today, 1st of February (2011)) as we were both fuming that we got failed on security when they had screwed up our data in the first place (so that the CORRECT answers as far as we were concerned, may not be what they have listed).

Myself, my wife and my brother went into the branch, without making a prior appointment, and stood around looking for an advisor. When one approached us, and asked if she could help I asked to see the manager. We were told that it was the managers day off, so I asked to see the advisor who knew about the case. We were told she was with a customer, I just replied "We''ll wait". We were told she might be some time, I just repeated myself and we found some seats near the entrance and began to wait. The advisor who greeted us, had a quick word with the advisor we wanted to see and came over to tell us that the complaint had been upscaled to the complaints department. I told her that there was an issue with the complaints department and that we would not be leaving the branch until we were satisfied with what was happening. Th advisor we wanted to see broke away from her current customer to acknowledge our presence and I gave her a brief run down of the problems we were having. She informed us that she was with a client and would be about half an hour, she did not mind if we waited but assured us that if we wanted to go and do anything in the mean time, she would see us when we got back. I was happy for this, so we went for a coffee.

Just as we walked out of the branch, my brothers phone rang. This was the call back he should have received last night. He spoke to them, was fobbed off, told he needed to go into branch with ID, he replied that he had already done that, was then told that this call was only to do with failing security, was put on hold while the caller "conferred" with a colleague and after 8 minutes was cut off. More ammunition for when we went back in.

Once we actually got to sit down with the advisor, explained about the phone call we had just received, explained about the problems with the e-banking that had occurred since our last meeting and since complaints had "taken over" and explained about the lack of communication and the fact the manager seemed to be dodging us, she said how angry she was. I told her in no uncertain terms that she could not be as angry as us. She called the complaints department. Spoke to a case handler, then passed the phone to me and my brother in turn so that we could bend his ear a little. The guy on the phone was also quite understanding and helpful, although he did keep saying he understood how inconvenient this was. I reminded him that I was not phoning for sympathy - and that he was lucky that he was dealing with a mix up between family members who trust each other and talk to each other, as there could quite well have been stuff on our accounts we didn't want the other to see and that I had the ability to EMPTY my brothers accounts at will, and if this had been 2 people with the same name at either ends of the country, it would be far more serious than it currently was. My brother also expressed his displeasure and inconvenience at the entire situation, mostly the length of time it is taking and lack of communication that we have received and poor level of service from the complaints department themselves. We further corrected our personal details with him, and I now have to wait another 7 to 10 days for new on-line banking details. Meaning I will not have been able to manage my accounts easily for at least 3-4 weeks.

We did leave the branch feeling like something had been achieved, and we WILL be discussing compensation when it is all finally resolved, but my brother is being a little twitchy just in case he cannot access his on-line accounts when they reset mine.

I don't think I have missed anything here, but it has been such a long arduous process I may well have done.

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

• Original Post - Post #01, 07:03 PM, Tuesday, 1st February, 2011
• Update 01 – Post #20, 12:59 PM, Thursday, 3rd February, 2011
• Update 02 – Post #23, 00:28 AM, Friday, 4th February, 2011
• Update 03 – Post #24, 10:49 AM, Friday, 4th February, 2011
• Update 04 – Post #35, 10:09 AM, Tuesday, 8th February, 2011
• Update 05 – Post #52, 03:03 PM, Tuesday, 15th February, 2011
• Update 06 – Post #55, 10:55 PM, Tuesday, 15th February, 2011
• Update 07 – Post #57, 12:17 PM, Wednesday, 2nd March, 2011
• Update 08 – Post #58, 12:23 PM, Wednesday, 2nd March, 2011
• Update 09 – Post #61, 10:22 AM, Thursday, 3rd March, 2011
• Update 10 – Post #71, 10:37 AM, Monday, 7th March, 2011
• Update 11 – Post #74, 06:58 PM, Tuesday, 8th March, 2011
• Update 12 – Post #75, 07:56 PM, Wednesday, 9th March, 2011
• Update 13 – Post #80, 06:51 PM, Friday, 11th March, 2011
• Update 14 – Post #81, 12:58 PM, Tuesday, 15th March, 2011
• Update 15 - Post #84, 09:50 PM, Wednesday, 16th March, 2011
• Update 16 - Post #86, 02:47 PM, Friday, 1st April, 2011
• Update 17 - Post #91, 11:33 PM, Saturday, 2nd April, 2011
• Update 18 - Post #92, 04:47 PM, Tuesday, 5th April, 2011
• Update 19 - Post #99, 08:57 PM, Wednesday, 6th April, 2011

Navigate this complaint

URL="http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=40869092&postcount=20"][U][SIZE=1]Next Update[/SIZE][/U][/URL

jonesMUFCforever

That is one hell of a long post.
I gave up I'm afraid.

When you complain keep it short or it will end up in the bin.

zppp

Oh dear god. I also lost the will to live.

OP if you complain;

Keep what happened to one or two lines to bring a context to the situation.
Bullet point the errors they have made.
Bullet point any costs etc you have incurred and what you want from them.

Cmdr_Bond

I appreciate the fact soome may lose the will reading that, I just had to vent - I should have put a long post warning in the title, sorry.

RE: the complaint, the complaint is ongoing, and this was just an account of events up until today. I just needed to vent.

Esoog

Cmdr_Bond wrote: »

I appreciate the fact soome may lose the will reading that, I just had to vent - I should have put a long post warning in the title, sorry.

RE: the complaint, the complaint is ongoing, and this was just an account of events up until today. I just needed to vent.

Sometimes it helps to explain all the facts, some people these days are very impatient!

Op; sounds like a total disaster

ffacoffipawb

Cmdr_Bond wrote: »

Today has been the first day in which I have seen a light at the end of the tunnel.

Let me explain. I am an identical twin, to make matters worse (or more confusing for some) mine and my brothers names are swapped round (I am ABC, he is BAC).

We both opened bank accounts with Abbey National many many years ago, between us we now have 4 bank accounts and 2 savings accounts with them (1 of my bank accounts is a joint account with my wife).

Last year (2010), around July/August my bro moved house. Around September/October he sorted out his change of address with Santander (yes, he should of done it sooner). The next statement I received said Mr BBC (remember I am ABC and he is BAC).

I logged on to my on-line banking, only to find I cannot change my personal details. Made the long distance call to India, to be told I had to go into a branch. So I dutifully made the journey into a branch to correct my name details on the account.

Within a week, me and my wife were round my brothers, and my wife noticed his latest statement also read Mr. BBC. We suggested he went into the same branch that I did to get this sorted. For some reason he did not. He went into his local branch, whose computers were down, so he went into a Santander Agency across the road.

He provided them with identification and details of his accounts. To make things absolutely clear I went into the same Agency the following day (with my wife), spoke to the same person my brother did, and also provided her with details of our accounts and our identification. (These included screen-shots from both mine and my brothers on-line banking log ons to show whose accounts belonged where).

This was November last year (2010). I have since received statements in the correct name, so thought it was all sorted - how wrong could I be.

In January this year (2011), I paid a cheque into my account (Xmas present). Whilst I paid mine in through a machine, my brother paid his in over the counter. It was here we found out all was still not well, as they had put all 6 accounts under his name. Yet we could still only manage our own accounts on-line.

I was now on the warpath, went phoned up the main branch that I originally went into, and demanded an appointment with the manager. I ended up with an appointment with an advisor (as they apparently have more access to the systems than a manager - a bit backwards if you ask me). I have to say, that I cannot fault the advisor one bit, in fact she has been VERY helpful.

She upscaled the issue to a full on complaint, advised me of the complaint's procedure blah blah blah. This was on the 14th of January (2011).

I received a confirmation letter from her (as did my brother), within a couple working of days, that this was now an official complaint, and it basically repeated what she had told me in the branch.

On the 18th or 19th of January (2011), I forget which, I was going through my statements on-line. I clicked to go to the next page and got a "this service is temporarily unavailable" message. I thought OK, technical glitch, these things happen and thought no more of it. Until yesterday (31st January (2011)) that is.

I tried logging on yesterday, and although the system accepted my credentials - under e-banking it still said that the service was unavailable. I phoned my brother, who checked his account, and was able to log in without issue and only his accounts were visible.

It was then I had a brain-ripple. I had TWO e-banking log ons. One for my first bank account and one for my joint account. I only ever used the joint one for the last few years as they had merged all my accounts so that I could see them from one login.

So I tried my other login - It worked - kind of. I had logged in and could see bank accounts - but they were not my accounts. Another phone call to my brother confirmed that under TWO SEPARATE LOGINS we could both see and worse transact on HIS accounts.

I had had enough, I phoned the branch at about 16:30 and asked to speak to either the advisor who had been dealing with this or the manager. The advisor was not in and the manager was nowhere to be found, but the person who answered the phone promised me that she would find the manager and get her to call me back before the branch closed (half an hour). At 16:55, I phoned back and got a different person, he went to get the manager and then came back to me and referred me to the complaints department saying that the manager had said that they (complaints department) had picked up the case on the 17th of January (2011). It was obvious to me that I was not going to get to speak to the manager, so I asked for the phone number for the complaints department, which I received, and asked if there was any reference or case number required, I was told no. BUT the complaint might be registered under my brothers name, because although it affected both of us, only his profile was available at the time the complaint was raised.

I was particularly furious now, as I had found out the complaints department had officially, even if not actually, been working on this case for 2 weeks - and yet neither myself or my brother had received any contact from them to say the matters were being resolved. I was also interested in the time scale, because this was either the day or two days before I lost my internet banking, which by the process of deduction led me to believe they actually HAD done SOMETHING.

I tested the phone number to make sure the department was still open, then phone my brother just in case they needed to speak to him. He was worried I might be on hold for a while, so told me to call back straight away and he would be over as soon as possible.

I phoned the complaints department, dealt with the automated robots and was on hold for a very short time before I got through to someone. I went through the security checks for my account only to be told there were no complaints listed against my account. I explained that it may be under my brothers account and that he was on his way. A minute or 2 later he came through the door and I handed him the phone. After he went through the security checks he was told he had FAILED, and that he would get a call back on his number (luckily a mobile) within 2 hours. By 21:00, this had not happened, so we resolved to march on the branch the following day (Today, 1st of February (2011)) as we were both fuming that we got failed on security when they had screwed up our data in the first place (so that the CORRECT answers as far as we were concerned, may not be what they have listed).

Myself, my wife and my brother went into the branch, without making a prior appointment, and stood around looking for an advisor. When one approached us, and asked if she could help I asked to see the manager. We were told that it was the managers day off, so I asked to see the advisor who knew about the case. We were told she was with a customer, I just replied "We''ll wait". We were told she might be some time, I just repeated myself and we found some seats near the entrance and began to wait. The advisor who greeted us, had a quick word with the advisor we wanted to see and came over to tell us that the complaint had been upscaled to the complaints department. I told her that there was an issue with the complaints department and that we would not be leaving the branch until we were satisfied with what was happening. Th advisor we wanted to see broke away from her current customer to acknowledge our presence and I gave her a brief run down of the problems we were having. She informed us that she was with a client and would be about half an hour, she did not mind if we waited but assured us that if we wanted to go and do anything in the mean time, she would see us when we got back. I was happy for this, so we went for a coffee.

Just as we walked out of the branch, my brothers phone rang. This was the call back he should have received last night. He spoke to them, was fobbed off, told he needed to go into branch with ID, he replied that he had already done that, was then told that this call was only to do with failing security, was put on hold while the caller "conferred" with a colleague and after 8 minutes was cut off. More ammunition for when we went back in.

Once we actually got to sit down with the advisor, explained about the phone call we had just received, explained about the problems with the e-banking that had occurred since our last meeting and since complaints had "taken over" and explained about the lack of communication and the fact the manager seemed to be dodging us, she said how angry she was. I told her in no uncertain terms that she could not be as angry as us. She called the complaints department. Spoke to a case handler, then passed the phone to me and my brother in turn so that we could bend his ear a little. The guy on the phone was also quite understanding and helpful, although he did keep saying he understood how inconvenient this was. I reminded him that I was not phoning for sympathy - and that he was lucky that he was dealing with a mix up between family members who trust each other and talk to each other, as there could quite well have been stuff on our accounts we didn't want the other to see and that I had the ability to EMPTY my brothers accounts at will, and if this had been 2 people with the same name at either ends of the country, it would be far more serious than it currently was. My brother also expressed his displeasure and inconvenience at the entire situation, mostly the length of time it is taking and lack of communication that we have received and poor level of service from the complaints department themselves. We further corrected our personal details with him, and I now have to wait another 7 to 10 days for new on-line banking details. Meaning I will not have been able to manage my accounts easily for at least 3-4 weeks.

We did leave the branch feeling like something had been achieved, and we WILL be discussing compensation when it is all finally resolved, but my brother is being a little twitchy just in case he cannot access his on-line accounts when they reset mine.

I don't think I have missed anything here, but it has been such a long arduous process I may well have done.


:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

Sorry can't help, but this is a warning to parents of twins everywhere ...

If you call one (say) Arthur Brian Cooper and the other Brian Arthur Cooper, you really are going to cause them grief.

Cmdr_Bond

ffacoffipawb wrote: »

Sorry can't help, but this is a warning to parents of twins everywhere ...

If you call one (say) Arthur Brian Cooper and the other Brian Arthur Cooper, you really are going to cause them grief.

I will have to agree with you there - although there is a story behind that - apparently the hospital scans (30 years ago now) only showed one of us. Of course, come the delivery room that all changed. Supposedly unprepared for 2 of us, she just decided to switch the names.

About 12/13 years ago, when we first signed-on down the job centre, they had to change one of our DoB's because the system couldn't handle it.

That all said, the problem with Santander has been minimalised as we are related - if we had been 2 people of the same name (i.e. 2 John Smith's) with similar birth dates (not improbable) at different ends of the country, the problem we have had would have been far far worse.

scott_lithgows

I shared the same name as my Dad and had problems due to that fact,however these were nothing compared to the problems that (sh)abbey/santander caused me.
Why not toss a coin,the winner gets to move his accounts away from these clowns,the loser gets to move to a different bank/building society.You both win in the end!

Cmdr_Bond

I am so on the verge of dropping them, just waiting to see what compensation they offer me.

It doesn't help that although their service is currently !!!!!!, this is the first time in nearly 20 years I have had any issue with them. In fact in the past as "Abbey" they have been incredibly helpful. It also doesn't help that they currently have some of the better deals in the market place for both savings and current accounts.

ERICS_MUM

Cmdr_Bond wrote: »

I appreciate the fact soome may lose the will reading that, I just had to vent - I should have put a long post warning in the title, sorry.

RE: the complaint, the complaint is ongoing, and this was just an account of events up until today. I just needed to vent.

It was long but completely "followable" and you needed to get it out of your system. My sister had a fraud prob with them which took 6 months to sort out - she has now moved to Nat West and so far is happy with them.

All I can do is wish you luck and perseverance - keep pushing, make a nuisance of yourself until it's sorted to your satisfaction.

Linda xx

Gav8

I followed it no problem.

I'd say keep a log of all the time you've wasted trying to get this corrected as I think the compensation is in part linked to how many hours of your life you've wasted (someone correct me if I'm wrong). I'd also log potential costs for time off work, travel expenses etc.

They'll probably offer you £25 compensation, which seems to be standard. I'd tell them where to stick it and hold out for more according to the costs from above.

Lastly, don't consider moving to another bank, do it, they aren't just bad, they are truly appalling. They've done similar to many other customers and clearly haven't fixed their problems since I had issues with them in July last year. Transferring accounts to another bank is usually quite easy and once it's done you can breathe a sigh of relief at being free from the beast that is Santander.