Barclays bank scandal exposed

cheggers

My advise is go to customer services at your bank and get them to set your account to zero marketing material by post or phone.

Then get them to get it set up on your account for no sales questions, so then when you goto the counter to pay money in it should flag up for the cashier not to try and sell you a credit card or other products, if they do start there sales speal ask them if they can read, if they say yes, say you clearly have not read what is on your screen.

amandathepanda

In my bank it doesn't show on my cashier screen if there is a no marketing marker, you have to go on to a bank office machine, so asking if the cashier can read wouldn't be very clever.

PBA

AJolly wrote: »

Theres plenty of evidence to back the accusations, (video footage) if you watched the program last night you would see this all for yourself.

I'll admit I didn't watch the program, and I would really like to have seen it. However I was mainly referring to the accusation that they were breaching FSA regulations, yet gave no evidence of this in the article on the BBC website.

Some of the accusations were truly laughable. Is it wrong to sell home insurance to a 70 year old - of course not. If I look at a customer's direct debits and notice their repayments have just gone up, is it wrong to suggest remortgaging? If they're only paying the minimum on their credit card, why shouldn't I suggest a loan?

The suggestion that people get signed up for products without them even knowing is clearly wrong. It's also incredibly easy for banks to trace once a couple of complaints come in, and those employees go to jail.

cheggers wrote:

if they do start there sales spiel ask them if they can read, if they say yes, say you clearly have not read what is on your screen.

Do you also get offended by the posters on the walls and the leaflets in the dispensers? Ignoring the fact that it's impossible to define a sales conversation, if you're not interested then you could just say that and end the conversation rather than getting offended.

trisontana

Another worrying thing which that programme exposed is that both undercover reporters were given jobs with Barclays using false Cvs and references.

I am afraid that any job with "targets" (where your job prospects will suffer if you don't meet them) will provide temptation for staff to cut corners. Hence the call centre staff falsely calling themselves "account advisers" when they were in fact sales staff. And phoning people who had specifically requested not to receive any calls.

trets77

loved the quote at the end from that head office women " not representive of how Barclays conducts buisiness and i,m sure our millions of customers agree"

here is a word from a perement Ex -customer " I THINK THEY HAVE YOU BANG TO RIGHTS !!"

Bank Bashing it so fun cause they so deserve it :T :T :T :T :T

trisontana

trets77 wrote: »

loved the quote at the end from that head office women " not representative of how Barclays conducts business and i,m sure our millions of customers agree"

here is a word from a prevent Ex -customer " I THINK THEY HAVE YOU BANG TO RIGHTS !!"

Bank Bashing it so fun cause they so deserve it :T :T :T :T :T

In many businesses this appears to be the stock answer when wrong-doing is exposed, whether it's a dodgy double-glazing firm or a big corporation. According to them it's always a "small minority" or a rogue salesman. "Robust systems are in place to prevent things like this happening". Don't these people in their ivory towers realise that if you give people unrealistic targets to meet, or their living wage depends on earning commission then things like this are bound to happen?

brownie2

I used to work in a bank and a colleauge of mine got put on a disciplinary because she didnt sell a credit card to a 75 year old, shocking really

trisontana

I have just been doing some searching on the Internet about this story and was surprised to see that there were a lot of stories in Dutch about the programme. I then realised that Barclays want to take over a Dutch bank, and that many people in the Netherlands watch BBC1 on cable. So will this negative publicity cause the Dutch bank (and its customers) to think again about climbing into bed with a company like Barclays ?

clark1982

if you missed it, you can stream the whole programme from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6474005.stm

regularsaver1

some of it was a predictable

i bet the managers didn't get told of for encouraging them to do these sales