Another A&L/Santandare Warning, protect your money!

rjm2k1

I've seen a few warnings re A&L/Santandare but not this one, in addition to them being hopeless at letting me open accounts their website allows you to quick transfer from ISA to ISA but they have just told me that if you do so it's not an ISA transfer so you LOSE your exising ISA protected money. I moved some money from my Direct 6 ISA to my Direct 7 ISA, the website allows you to do this and nowhere does it say it's not an ISA transfer therefore even though it's going into another ISA account it somehow is treated differently than if you had done a paper ISA transfer form!

Be warned!

In addition to them forcing me to have 2 new cashcards I don't want in order to get new ISA (1 flex for this years funding and 1 direct 7 to transfer previous years into), they failed to send me any paperwork for the actual ISAs, failed to even differentiate between them online (they both appear as Cash ISA so you can't tell which is which) and now they have allowed me to do an account to account transfer which somehow loses the protection despite both accounts being ISAs!

Sadly, this year is now messed up as I'm stuck with them but I'll be leaving ASAP next year, come to think of it I can open an ISA elsewhere and xfer my existing subs to that I believe?

ses6jwg

you do realise that there is absolutely no point opening an issue 7 if youve got an issue 6 with more than 14.5k in don't you, have you read the literature sent to you?

rjm2k1

ses6jwg wrote: »

you do realise that there is absolutely no point opening an issue 7 if youve got an issue 6 with more than 14.5k in don't you, have you read the literature sent to you?

They haven't sent me any literature, not even a welcome pack for the account. I have got in the habit over the last few years of A&L quietly knocking down the interest rate of my Direct ISA to 0.1% meaning I have to open a new ISA and transfer in. Are you saying that they no longer knock the interest rate down to 0.1%?

After speaking to them again it seems that they haven't got a clue, the ISA Services team disagreed with the Internet help desk and told me that the money transferred between ISAs will count as ISA money (wasn't very clear if they meant existing or new subscription) but told me that to transfer the rest I needed to get the transfer form off the internet, she talked me through finding it and was clearly seeing a different website to me so passed me back to the Internet helpdesk who told me the forms are not online and wanted to pass me back to the ISA services team to ask for the welcome pack I should have been sent in the first place!

In the meantime I thought I would move my money to Barclays but they don't understand ISA's either , the guy on the phone told me I needed to take my money OUT of my existing ISA into my current account! to then send it into a new ISA, I told him he should not be advising people to remove money from their ISA in such a way as they would lose their previous years allowance.

Shocking customer services from both organisations!

ses6jwg

barclays are a waste of time they dont offer transfers in

if you have a direct isa issue 6 with more than 14.5k you get 2.5% for another 12 months.

if you have less, you need to transfer into a fixed rate or transfer out to another provider if you need instant access

rjm2k1

Yeah, I can't believe Barclays only offer a non transfer in ISA, I have a large pot of cash that would be heading their way otherwise!

Santandare are terrible, the A&L website used to have xfer forms and information on, the Santandare site doesn't even seem to know what an ISA is, if you type "transfer isa" or even "isa" into the help/search boxes there is absolutely no information about them whatsoever, plus the ISA team still think the transfer forms are online when they aren't and the internet team think that the ISA team send them out, which they don't!

Baldur

rjm2k1 wrote: »

Yeah, I can't believe Barclays only offer a non transfer in ISA, I have a large pot of cash that would be heading their way otherwise!

Santander & Barclays aren't the only Cash ISA providers, there are lots of other providers/accounts that accept ISA transfers, e.g. Nationwide @ 3.1% AER or Halifax @3% AER, while others don't; read through this regularly-updated 'best buy' post to see if any suit you - http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=4603369&postcount=1

rjm2k1

Baldur wrote: »

Santander & Barclays aren't the only Cash ISA providers, there are lots of other providers/accounts that accept ISA transfers, e.g. Nationwide @ 3.1% AER or Halifax @3% AER, while others don't; read through this regularly-updated 'best buy' post to see if any suit you - http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.php?p=4603369&postcount=1

Hi, thanks yes I'm aware of that but was already with A&L and will shortly be moving the money to Barclays anyway for an offset mortgage.

I finally received the literature for my ISA today and it turns out that I have done EXACTLY what they say to transfer the money! They have now admitted they were wrong (disguised admission by saying that because I was with A&L they will give me the facilities I previously had?) so despite being told that it was impossible to undo the transactions their ISA Reset team will now be doing exactly that.

They didn't seem to think it's an issue that they are sending out documentation that tells customers that for an internal ISA transfer they should do it online rather than using the external transfer form they send out, thus loosing their isa allowance for this year! They said that they can tell how many people are doing so and would spot any issues, despite the person I talked to earlier saying that it's a perfectly valid thing to expect that transfering from one ISA to another ISA will use your ISA allowance for this tax year!