Is it time to end "Santander Bashing"?

someone

I was reading one of the threads on here which was a query about how a specialist Santander product worked. The first reply back was the typical "Santander Bashing" that has gone on for a long time on here.

It just felt unhelpful, counter-productive and unneeded.

I personally move to them for the £100. There was one slight hitch which was sorted out with one letter + revived an account credit for the issue. I have in total have 4 accounts with them.

Recently moved my ISA from them due to the rate dipping after the bonus period and was really impressed with how quick they handled it, even though it had to go via the receiving back. Much quicker than my last ISA transfer.

It does seem that the majority of issues stem from the A+L merger which didn't go so smoothly. Obviously transferring accounts between different bank systems is going to be right pain for them and it didn't go too well.

Is it not time to look at Santander again and not jump to any conclusions?

Lokolo

That would be OK, a lot of the regular users don't tend to go for banks with the high quality service, more of the high quality product. However a lot of newer users do want high quality service, so a warning is needed

meer53

My Santander complaint was nothing to do with the A & L merger, nothing to do with transferring from another bank, their customer service is appalling, end of. Even their customer relations department service is dire. There must be people like yourself who haven't had any problems, i hope it stays that way for you.

DeeMarie89

I agree. My husband and I have always been very happy with Santander. They sort out card fraud instantly (and after having dealt with Lloyds TSB when it came to card fraud, it made me realise how good Santander are, but that's another story)
I will admit that the Santander FP limits are a pain at times, but as far as customer service goes, they seem to do things quickly. OD's are amended in seconds, card fraud sorted out immediately etc

diable

someone wrote: »

I was reading one of the threads on here which was a query about how a specialist Santander product worked. The first reply back was the typical "Santander Bashing" that has gone on for a long time on here.

It just felt unhelpful, counter-productive and unneeded.

I personally move to them for the £100. There was one slight hitch which was sorted out with one letter + revived an account credit for the issue. I have in total have 4 accounts with them.

Recently moved my ISA from them due to the rate dipping after the bonus period and was really impressed with how quick they handled it, even though it had to go via the receiving back. Much quicker than my last ISA transfer.

It does seem that the majority of issues stem from the A+L merger which didn't go so smoothly. Obviously transferring accounts between different bank systems is going to be right pain for them and it didn't go too well.

Is it not time to look at Santander again and not jump to any conclusions?

I will give you £200 for your soul and £300 for your first born.............

pmduk

When Santander start providing a good service as basic for their customers, I'll be happy to stop bashing them. As that is unlikely to happen soon, it's open season on them. A friend who is silly enough to have his account with them has just waited a month for them to find his pension credit. That's a basic banking function which they don't understand!

someone

diable wrote: »

I will give you £200 for your soul and £300 for your first born.............

This is what I'm trying to say is unhelpful and does not contribute to the discussion. Guess what, other banks offer switching bonuses (FirstDirect, think Halifax use to aswell). You're more likely to be arrested than switch current accounts so there has to be some incentive to switch.

So what if I got £100 for moving to them, I get good deals and a fantastic service.

throughtherain

someone wrote: »

This is what I'm trying to say is unhelpful and does not contribute to the discussion. Guess what, other banks offer switching bonuses (FirstDirect, think Halifax use to aswell). You're more likely to be arrested than switch current accounts so there has to be some incentive to switch.

So what if I got £100 for moving to them, I get good deals and a fantastic service.

No-one's knocking you for getting £100 to move to them, it's just that the general concensus amongst a lot of people is that moving to them simply isn't worth the £100.

It's great that you've had a good experience with them and I guess it's good to share that and make it known too, but even you had a some sort of hitch with them. People have had such a negative experience with this particular company about something that is very important to them and their peace of mind that they quite rightly feel aggrieved by it.

Biggles

I suspect their bad reputation is more historical than actual.

I opened a current a/c and regular saver with them for the interest rates. I've found their customer service to be the best of any of the (many) banks I have accounts with, particularly in branch were the guy really went out of his way to be helpful.

I seem to recall the current bank topping the complaints table is Barclays, not Santander, anyway.

So yes, it's time to give the old Santander jokes a rest, I reckon. Unfortunately, people who had a bad experience with them or Abbey three or four years ago keep trotting them out at the very mention of the name...

opinions4u

While people are more likely to post about bad service, there is nothing to stop somebody posting about good Santander experiences.

They earned their poor reputation. If they want to change the way they are perceived they need to improve the way they deal with customers and also ensure that their complaints service puts things right with minimum fuss.

Until they do that, bash away.

blueberrypie

someone wrote: »

It does seem that the majority of issues stem from the A+L merger which didn't go so smoothly. Obviously transferring accounts between different bank systems is going to be right pain for them and it didn't go too well.

While there were a lot of issues stemming from that, there are still many people experiencing problems, and Santander seem to be remarkably bad at dealing with those problems when they come up. They've also managed to send out thousands of statements to the wrong people, and their Faster Payments implementation is woeful.

Bear in mind too that Santander had incorporated Abbey customers into their own systems some time before merging A&L, and had experienced many of the same problems with that process - but still didn't fix those problems before moving ahead with the A&L customers.

Overall, they display a remarkable unwillingness to learn from their mistakes, to fix their mistakes, to get new things right, or to improve their ongoing service.

If there were just one or two posters who were diving in to bash Santander at every opportunity, preventing that might be reasonable. But it's not - it's *lots* of people, all of whom feel the same. Would you prefer that those who ask about Santander accounts were not informed of the issues? I would certainly rather be given full information (and opinion) and then make up my mind, rather than making a decision without being aware of the existence of a problem.