Check your address occasionally if you're with Natwest

flavia84

Just wanted to warn people to periodically check their address if you bank with Natwest (I don't know if this applies to other banks), especially if you live in an area where mail occasionally gets mis-delivered.

Apparently, they have a policy that if a letter is returned to them undelivered (or if someone posted it back to them because it was mis-delivered), they delete your address from the account, as they assume that the person has moved and has not contacted them of their new address. They have a policy of not contacting the account holder when this happens, even if they have other means of communication, ie. phone number, even if they use that same phone number to contact you about other security matters.

They also told me that the problem won't be flagged up unless the customer requests it (and how can they, if they don't know that their address got deleted in the first place?). You would think that the problem would be solved when a new address is given (I moved a couple of months ago, and had immediately given them my new address), but as they had unsuccessfully tried to send me a card, they won't automatically send a new card to the new address, even if the existing card you have is expiring. So the card expires, all this comes to light, and you have to wait a 5-7 working days not having a card whislt they send you a new one, plus they send you a new pin, so that takes another couple of extra days.

When I talked to them, they defended the policy of not calling people, even though they had my contact number, and not flagging it up before, not even when I gave them my new address!

zppp

flavia84 wrote: »

Apparently, they have a policy that if a letter is returned to them undelivered (or if someone posted it back to them because it was mis-delivered), they delete your address from the account, as they assume that the person has moved and has not contacted them of their new address.

They don't delete the address, that remains in file even if they think it incorrect. They simply stop correspondence to that address.

As for contacting you, you don't realise the sheer volume of returned mail that they get. It runs into hundreds of thousands of items a year.

flavia84

Yes, they had the address on file, they had just stopped using it.

What annoys me is that I had no idea that there was a problem with my address for over a year. I was using the account regularly over this time, and I had several telephone conversations with them over several topics in that time, including (ironically) changing my address to my new one. Surely they could have flagged up the problem at any one of those phone calls, especially as they were aware that I wouldn't be sent a new card once my existing one expired?

It caused a lot of problems when my card expired without them sending me a new one (actually it expired a couple of weeks before it was due to expire). I was actively looking in the post for my new card then, as I knew that my card was about to expire. After my card expired, I went into the branch, where they told me that I had requested the card to be sent to the branch (this wasn't true), and as I hadn't collected it, it was destroyed. They had sent that card back in 2009, even though my card didn't expire until 2011, and thus did not not they were sending me another card!

Sorry if I came across a bit harsh in my first post, it's just that I had to wait nearly 3 weeks to receive both card and PIN (card arrived first, PIN took surprisingly long to arrive), and it's just a pain to have to go to the branch every day just to get a bit of money, plus I couldn't do any online payments as I didn't have a card number, one regular online payment got close to being cancelled because of it...

Perhaps they do get lots of returned mail each year, but I think they should have a system of alerting you if something is wrong, especially when you are contacting them for other matters (afterall, if you're already calling them for something else, it wouldn't cost them anything to just tell you?).

zppp

flavia84 wrote: »

Perhaps they do get lots of returned mail each year, but I think they should have a system of alerting you if something is wrong, especially when you are contacting them for other matters (afterall, if you're already calling them for something else, it wouldn't cost them anything to just tell you?).

I do agree. They used to update details over the telephone on every call, but customers used to get massively aggravated having to go through it each time.

LudaMusser

I used to bank with HSBC, I moved out of my Dad`s address but left his address as my home address as we have a communal letterbox and things go missing now and then. I made a complaint to HSBC about something and they sent a letter to my Dad`s, I did`nt reply so they locked down my account! I could`nt get any money out so I went in and they looked on my file and explained what had happened. I would`nt have minded but when they asked how I wanted them to respond to my complaint I put email so what did they do, bombard me with calls to my mobile and send a letter, everything but an email..

I`m no longer with HSBC

flavia84

Natwest were just the opposite: they said that unless by letter to my address, they couldn't contact me at all! And they had both my phone number (which they used before for security reasons) and my email! And, I have online banking as well! Lots of ways to contact me, really!

It seems they can't be sensible and contact people at appropriate times, they go to either extreme! Why couldn't they just contact people if there were problems, but not bombard people like you experienced? It's common sense afterall!

With this post, I just wanted to warn people that it wouldn't be the worst thing to do to ask the bank if all their details were correct, because they don't necessarily warn you otherwise.