NatWest Text Alerts

Agricolae

Hi Neil, not sure if you're still following this thread but I have fairly detailed knowledge where NatWest are concerned.

NatWest don't offer text alerts as a "contractual" service but as an additional means of receiving various alerts and reminders. Because the service is not contractual I doubt very much that you will get far either with the complaints department or the Ombudsman, or indeed court action. Obviously it's extremely annoying when text alerts "go missing" but NatWest are quite flexible when it comes to direct debits (D/Ds).

D/Ds go via BACS and can therefore be recalled (unlike Standing Orders). If you don't have funds to cover a D/D on the day you can phone up and ask for it to be recalled up until 7:30pm or whenever the bank's systems shut down for nightly maintenance. If you recall a D/D in this way you don't get charged by the bank although the beneficiary may complain.

This doesn't solve your issue with the alerts not coming through. Unfortunately it is in the small print and that is enough for the bank not to be liable. It's probably too late now if you've already gone off the deep end at NatWest staff, but my recommendation (assuming you've had D/Ds go unpaid) is to explain the situation to a complaints handler, say that you feel it's a bit unfair for them to penalise you given the situation, and ask for them to waive your unpaid fees.

NB: NatWest don't recognise post-dated cheques and will attempt to honour them before the date on the cheque if the beneficiary pays it into their account. Think I should warn you about that before you get any nasty surprises.

MoneySaverNeil

Thanks for all these replies.

As I said before, I spend many hours on spreadsheets trying to forecast everything, but am not perfect... (unlike our Banks ). Occasionally I miss something, or a totally Unexpected payment comes in, and takes me over overdraft limit. When this happens I want to be Alerted so funds can transfer to cover it.

It's not just failures of text messages we're talking about. It's Email too. In the case I refer to, the NatWest system has simply ignored the need for an alert (a failure admitted by customer complaints, which surprised me as I expected to be blamed for Not receving it !)

I suppose the ideal solution is to have a 'float' of £'000s in the account (on which I guess I'd receive 0.1 % though maybe that's generous), so any unexpected amount would always be covered.

Anyway I have written detailed three-page letter to NatWest complaints team about this issue and two other unaccpetable issues... wish I'd never gone to them

stclair

Agricolae wrote: »

Hi Neil, not sure if you're still following this thread but I have fairly detailed knowledge where NatWest are concerned.

NatWest don't offer text alerts as a "contractual" service but as an additional means of receiving various alerts and reminders. Because the service is not contractual I doubt very much that you will get far either with the complaints department or the Ombudsman, or indeed court action. Obviously it's extremely annoying when text alerts "go missing" but NatWest are quite flexible when it comes to direct debits (D/Ds).

D/Ds go via BACS and can therefore be recalled (unlike Standing Orders). If you don't have funds to cover a D/D on the day you can phone up and ask for it to be recalled up until 7:30pm or whenever the bank's systems shut down for nightly maintenance. If you recall a D/D in this way you don't get charged by the bank although the beneficiary may complain.

This doesn't solve your issue with the alerts not coming through. Unfortunately it is in the small print and that is enough for the bank not to be liable. It's probably too late now if you've already gone off the deep end at NatWest staff, but my recommendation (assuming you've had D/Ds go unpaid) is to explain the situation to a complaints handler, say that you feel it's a bit unfair for them to penalise you given the situation, and ask for them to waive your unpaid fees.

NB: NatWest don't recognise post-dated cheques and will attempt to honour them before the date on the cheque if the beneficiary pays it into their account. Think I should warn you about that before you get any nasty surprises.

Its actually 14.30 on the day the DD debits the account :-)

Agricolae

stclair wrote: »

Its actually 14.30 on the day the DD debits the account :-)

This is the time quoted to customers, yes. However in reality it only applies to the automatic system which decides whether to pay an item or not. Staff are able to override this manually up until whenever the "computer says no".

jalexa

Agricolae wrote: »

NatWest don't offer text alerts as a "contractual" service but as an additional means of receiving various alerts and reminders. Because the service is not contractual I doubt very much that you will get far either with the complaints department or the Ombudsman...

I don't think that is necessarily true because the Ombudsman doesn't adjudicate on a "judicial" basis but considers matters of "reasonableness". Given that an issue reaching the Ombudsman must already have been subject to a complaint's process, then additionally the complaint's process is "in play".

Very occasional random failure is entirely different to "systemic" failure. Regardless of the "contract", the bank (or it's Text contractor) must make reasonable endeavours to deliver the service. Whether they did or they didn't, and the diligence of the complaint's process is, I believe, a valid issue for an Ombudsman referral.

pelirocco

MoneySaverNeil wrote: »

Yes, I spend many hours on spreadsheets forecasting, but occasionally an unexpected payment appears e.g. a postdated cheque sent six months earlier; or a new suppliers direct debit.

As someone else has said, the varying dates and amounts are a nightmare, despite best efforts.

Thanks for the feedback on First Direct (texts arriving the following day when it's too late !)

But it's not all about Text. I deliberately also set Email alert, along with Text alert so I'm sure to get one of them. Seems their system just doesn't work reliably to send out the Alerts as they advertise.

Anyway I've started formal complaints procedure about this issue with NatWest, and a couple of other issues where I seem to have been directly lied to or misled.

Also, how about this over the Easter weekend ? A number of direct debits due Tues 10th April actually showed up on my account Thurs 5th April... I coudn't access my own money from April 5th although not due until five days later ! What were NatWest doing with my money during this time. Maybe speculating on derivatives ? Maybe giving an extra advance Bonus to someone...

Looks like I've seriously made the wrong choice of Bank here... but who else is doing a proper competent job... the bar is low

With cashflow forecasting , neither of those instances should cause a problem , because you will know they are coming . Post dated cheques should be deducted from your forecast at the time they became due for payment , the fact they are presented late is neither here nor there . New supplier DD? in my experience suppliers always tell you when and how much they will be duducting . I can not comment on DD being deducted on varying dates , as I have never experienced that , my companies have several regular DD's and the only time the dates vary is if they fall on a weekend and or bank holiday , and I allow for this in my forecasting by deducting them on the last banking date before the weekend/ holiday .

You could always log into your account each morning to check

stclair

Agricolae wrote: »

This is the time quoted to customers, yes. However in reality it only applies to the automatic system which decides whether to pay an item or not. Staff are able to override this manually up until whenever the "computer says no".

Really that's fantastic however the DD would have to be cancelled and reset up by the customer again. I've worked in a CLC nearly 5 years and what you have quoted is not a policy that is currently exercised. Otherwise the customer would have to do a DDI claim after 6.30 and the system ticks over to the next day. I would be interest to know what options you use in back office for this override send me a private message. On the alert it days 12.00 but you actually get till 14.30 the computer starts saying no after about 14.40.

madgagoo

Stclair, I have managed to get a payment returned at about 1505. I agree with you though, in practice anything after about 1440 and 'computer says no'. Certainly 1830 is far too late and DDI would be required.

pmduk

Frankly it's a case of God help the customer's if the bank's own staff can't agree how the system works.

skintdad

I use the iPhone app every morning to make sure every DD gets paid. Once I forgot to put the money in on time, paid in at 3:30 and phoned telephone banking to get them to put it through manually. They kept saying it had been paid. I kept telling them that it would only show as rejected at 2:30 the next morning and they kept saying it wouldn't. Anyway it was rejected, seems most staff don't know how to manually re-present it. The only way to ensure you don't get charged is to manage your account better yourself. Log in each morning and set phone alarm reminders to pay cash in if your prone to forget