Santander Debit Card Renewal

krislove

Hi all,

This is now the 5th time this has happened and I would love advice as to how I can escalate my complaint (already at High-Level) in order to actually get a result.

2.5 Years ago I moved from Edinburgh to London. I went into Santander branch and updated all my addresses to my current address in London. Anytime my debit card is damaged and I need a replacement it gets sent to my old branch in Edinburgh, 400 miles away. Even though I get a notification to my current London address that the card is at that branch and all statements and PIN numbers get sent to my London home. The last time this happened it took 3 months to solve, and even then it was only solved because I paid to travel to Edinburgh solely to collect my debit card.

After phoning the complaints hotline and filing another complaint they took all morning to research into the account to ensure that it didn't happen again. As part of this they cancelled my debit card and left me with no access to my money without going to a branch with photographic ID, which is tricky for me given my working hours.

Today I received another letter informing me that my new debit card was ready for collection in (you guessed it!) Edinburgh! I received £45.00 compensation last week as this is an on going issue, which is great but this is constantly happening and I am sick of their customer service team not able to resolve this issue.

To ensure a swift response and a resolution to my problem, are there any routes I can go down to make sure that this never happens again, and I am compensated for the additional costs incurred for not being able to access my money?

Thanks all!

CleanShirt

Are you an old Alliance & Leicester customer?

xylophone

"Anytime my debit card is damaged" - how often do you damage a card and how do you do it?
What explanation is given for not simply sending the card to your home address?

CleanShirt

One reason could be that the person has their mailbox listed as shared. Therefore it is automatically sent it to your 'local' branch because banks cant send stuff like cards to shared mailboxes.

Anthorn

The way to escalate a complaint with Santander is to follow their complaints procedure by writing to them at their head office. Then you have to wait for them to acknowledge the complaint and then to make a final decision. If it then is still not resolved you can take the complaint to the Financial Services Ombudsman. General advice would be to send your letter by signed for delivery which you can't do to a PO Box number. But that's Santander's problem, not your's. You have no control over their address. But getting a certificate of posting might be a good idea.

Complaints
Santander UK PLC
PO Box 1125
BRADFORD
BD1 9PG

Financial Services Ombudsman
South Quay Plaza
183 Marsh Wall
LONDON
E14 9SR

Agricolae

I'm not sure what kind of systems Santander use but they may have some kind of marker set on your account to "suppress" delivery of debit cards to your home address. This is just wild speculation...

It is possible that you could refer your original complaint to the Ombudsman if it wasn't that long ago that Santander "resolved" it. It sounds like an absolute nightmare. Have you been issued with a "final response" letter by Santander?