How can we prepare ourselves for future banking disasters???

MoneySaverLog

You also need a tin foil hat in case the martians invade, it will stop them melting your brain. Oh you don't have one I forgot.

innovate

MoneySaverLog wrote: »

You also need a tin foil hat in case the martians invade, it will stop them melting your brain. Oh you don't have one I forgot.

b**gger, I have clean run out of tin foil, you are right. None in the freezer, either.

Xing my fingers now that it's not the martians. Probably just Scots trying to save money by sacking their own people and give the jobs to folks in countries where they don't care much about people......

pqrdef

First essential is to get a bit ahead of yourself. Banks aren't the only things that can go wrong.

Don't eat all the food in the house before going shopping. People who say they've got babies to feed - what if you were ill?

Don't spend all your cash before going to the ATM. What if you lose your debit card and have to wait a week for another?

Don't spend all the money in the bank before payday. What if your employer has a glitch with the pay run?

Don't pay your bills on payday. Same reason.


That said, lessons need to be learned at many levels. People who pay wages might think about having a reserve arrangement with another bank.

And clearly the banks themselves need to rethink their contingency plans and come up with something much more radical.

Banks have always liked to keep their customers exclusive, but that's blown out of the water now. Banks will have to recommend their customers to open accounts at other banks for safety - especially if they want to maintain that guff about not being liable for consequential losses. And they'll need to make special arrangements to support this - e.g. your main bank, when it's having problems, could guarantee an emergency overdraft at your reserve bank.

MoneySaverLog

pqrdef wrote: »

your main bank, when it's having problems, could guarantee an emergency overdraft at your reserve bank.

What a radical concept, still in this day and age it may well happen one day

pqrdef

MoneySaverLog wrote: »

What a radical concept, still in this day and age it may well happen one day

The bosses of Barclays etc are all thanking their private gods that this isn't happening to them, because they all know it could happen to any of them. And leaning on each other is the best answer they've got.

This will cost RBS a fortune, either to pay compensation or to fight it. That should concentrate minds.

PasturesNew

If you think you'll spend any cash kept for emergencies, use a piggy bank/jar to collect 20p pieces..... under normal circumstances they'd be too annoying to tip out and use... but in an emergency you can easily find you've built up £20-30-50-100 in a piggy bank that you top up specifically "in case".

slopemaster

after a previous experience when Santander blocked my account, I have multiple bank accounts and cards - but I also have a piggy bank full of change, and some travellers' cheques.

TheBanker

I have two bank accounts with different banks - one is my main account and the other has a few hundred pounds in for emergencies. I set it up in case I lost my main card or there was a fault and I couldn't make payments. I also keep £100 in cash hidden at home for unexpected emergencies. I've only had to break into that a couple of times e.g when needing a taxi to the hospital in the middle of the night because my girlfriend had been in an accident Also came in handy when I was taken ill and had to ask my neighbour to fetch my prescriptions for me. I just feel more comfortable knowing I've always got a small amount of cash to hand and don't have to rely on my bank cards, local ATM working etc.

I also have a Fray Bentos pie and two tins of corned beef in the cellar just in case.....

Fiddlestick

MoneySaverLog wrote: »

Why would you have your main bank account with First Direct, they pay no interest on their current account like LTSB do.

A couple of quid in interest is nothing compared to the fantastic customer service that I have received from First Direct.

You couldn't pay me to leave them.

Acremead

Sifting through the rumour mill this fiasco seems to be associated with RBS having sacked thousands of IT staff and outsourcing to India. Seems reasonable to assume the problem was either caused or exacerbated by Indian staff being less familiar with RBS systems (eg being recently recruited), with no 'old hands' available to notice and catch the problem when it started. I think we've all experienced what happens when non-vital services such as call centres are sent off-shore so it seems risky to do the same with a core function like IT. So I'm wondering if all banks are similarly vulnerable or is RBS the only one to go so comprehensively down this route? It would be interesting to see a league table showing each banking group's relative exposure.