who offers the best online banking experience?

notafan

HSBC - its the one i find easiest to use, although i believe first directs its pretty much identical but just black and white not red and grey!
Whilst i'd say 99% of the time the available balance is upto date - pay in a shop/online with your card etc and check 5 seconds later and its upto date - there have been times that it goes days out of date and im sure its to try and make people go overdrawn!

Barclays- i havent used it for a while but the whole 3 balances thing was sometimes confusing (not sure if they changed it) and the PIN SENTRY thing is a pain. Last time i used it they pre approved you for offers like loans.

I find co-op painful to use - Its like internet banking after a nuclear holocaust.

Natwest/RBS I've not found a way to make a faster payment on the same day instantly, it never lets me put in 'todays date' and schedules payments for the next day after it. The App on the iPhone is useless other then for a balance check. The card reader is a total pain too, i wouldn't carry it around, its stuck in a drawer somewhere and it just makes you ring them if you need to do anything useful.

Halifax - similar to HSBC in terms of been pretty easy to use (although halifax credit cards are a bit of a pain as it normally makes you goto a different part and has a think even though its still within the halifax online bank thing. Plus i find the available balance to hardly ever be reliable it takes ages to update (not tried the new one though). I always found with halifax if something goes wrong its an age to get it sorted even more difficult if you dont speak battered mars bar for the dunfermaline call center :-)

Eco_Miser

In terms of the User Interface Yorkshire Bank lacks many of the distractions my other banks have -

• no adverts on the secure site,
• no 'upgrade now' buttons,
• transactions in a neat grid, with no oversized totals
• easy navigation.

Pity the FP limit is just £500, and interest rates non-existant:(

Overall, I like LloydsTSB.

rb10

notafan wrote: »

Natwest/RBS I've not found a way to make a faster payment on the same day instantly, it never lets me put in 'todays date' and schedules payments for the next day after it.

Natwest should default to sending Faster Payments instantly - one of the few good things about them is that their Faster Payments implementation has been significantly better than any other bank.

The user interface is awful though, in my opinion.

notafan wrote: »

Halifax - similar to HSBC in terms of been pretty easy to use (although halifax credit cards are a bit of a pain as it normally makes you goto a different part and has a think even though its still within the halifax online bank thing.

Are you thinking of either Natwest or Santander, who both (I believe) have separate credit card areas? Halifax's is definitely part of their main online banking; credit cards just show up as a different account.

notafan wrote: »

Plus i find the available balance to hardly ever be reliable it takes ages to update (not tried the new one though).

Never had this problem; mine always changes instantly.

notafan wrote: »

I always found with halifax if something goes wrong its an age to get it sorted even more difficult if you dont speak battered mars bar for the dunfermaline call center :-)

Better Scotland than India.

TashSmith1988

I have been with Nationwide since opening my first account ... they have always been brilliant for banking. Staff are friendly, online service is so easy to use, charges and rates are lowest that i've found for Over draft facilities ... Good savings rates/offers too!

I did take up banking with Alliance and Leicester last year (Also Santander and the company I happen to work for!) ... some people may be lucky but all round terrible service, facilities and customer relations. An all round a poor bank, taking on more then they can handle ...

naked

HSBC
It was a while ago now. I found it worked OK, no problems with it.

Northern Rock
A very long time ago. Found it a complete pain in the !!!! because you had to download a massive Java applet which often wouldn't load, and things would always lock up halfway through so you didn't know if it had worked or not.
I expect they have updated it now and it is much better.

Egg
Again, it was a while ago. I found it a bit more clunky and not as much functionality, but it did the job absolutely fine.

Santander
Works OK. OTP hardly ever gets requested though, but the idea is good. The faster payments thing is a big problem for me, as is being locked out for 2 weeks if your card is lost or stolen because this is part of your login details.

Halifax
Generally works fine, sometimes it hangs when loading. Internet banking will tell you in advance if a payment will be made by faster payments which is a good feature.
Bad points:

• you can't overpay a mortgage online (but you can make a BACS payment to your mortgage from another bank...)
• you can't bring up a copy of your latest credit card statement so you can see how much will be going out of your account tomorrow morning
• Credit card balances don't show up with the other balances. You have to click on the credit card account and open the statement to see the balance
• if you cancel a payment mandate/standing order it stays on your account but just says "DELETED" which is a bit annoying.

I haven't used any others. Some banks used to have a "try online banking" feature which let you log into a dummy account and play around to look at the features. i'm not sure if any still do this.

blueberrypie

naked wrote: »

Halifax
Generally works fine, sometimes it hangs when loading. Internet banking will tell you in advance if a payment will be made by faster payments which is a good feature.
Bad points:

• you can't bring up a copy of your latest credit card statement so you can see how much will be going out of your account tomorrow morning

You can see your latest credit-card statement in Halifax banking. Click on the credit card account, then on "previous statement" (just above the transaction list, towards the right-hand side).

bundly

I'm very happy with Nationwide except I'm SOOOO irritated by having to use a card reader, firstly to log on, then to make any payments AFTER you have logged on, which I think is stupid since you've just had to do it to log on anyway! Grrr! You get an 8 digit code that you have to imput, and each time it's a different code - grr!.

It means that, if you are at work or away from home on business or for pleasure you cannot log on to your internet banking unless you remembered to pack the blasted card reader --- grrr!!!

rfowler

I use Natwest and I have no complaints at all

Very good

[Deleted User]

Lloyds TSB - pretty good with the highest limit of £15,000 FPS and phone authorization when sending payments
Halifax - virtually same as TSB now
Santander - statement detail is pretty detailed with retailers name/location but outdated - it's OK
Co-Operative - baddest one i think, very basic and statement not detailed, basic page and looks dull - not recommended
Barclays - i think the best one as it is easy to navigate, card reader additional security, statement detailed and nice interface
HSBC - It is ok but i think it lacks some features
Metro Bank - love the real-time update and AJAX features, online statements actually have name + address and can see what letters you sent them but is buggy
Norwich and Peterborough - basic also but it works
Nationwide - it is ok but it lacks some basic features
Natwest and RBS - pretty good as statements detailed , easy to navigate interface

chris91_2

Of the ones I use:

LTSB - Okay, however is frequently failing...
Barclays - Simple and Easy to use
BOS - Very poor, a dumbed down LTSB version. Clunky looking as well...