MSE News: Santander to charge for 'free' business accounts

Gridlock

My company, Go Jumbo changed to Co-Op business banking a few years ago and would highly recommend it. To get free business banking with Co-Op you do have to join the Federation of Small Businesses (£120 p/a) but this gives access to a lot of other free services such as legal advise, which we have found useful. The free banking really has been free and they even give us £25 p/a as a thank you for banking with them. On-line banking is very good since they upgraded their systems and phone calls are answered fairly promptly.

stphnstevey

Just phoned - apparently not everyone recieved letter yet - made complaint, see what happens

Did mention you can have a Business Reserve account without incurring the fee (need to close business current account). But you lose debit card and cheque deposits, but accepts and able to make BAC's from it, so for me thats all really need

Gonna keep looking for others though

paultoon

Just to add my 2p worth, I'm self employed and will be switching from Santander as can't afford £90 per year. Another example of the banks helping small businesses! I'm a sole trader, trading under my own name, so I'm actually going to look at setting up a new personal current account to handle my business transactions as there's no legal requirement to have a business account, but I still want to keep everything separate from my main current account. Might be worth looking into for other sole traders.

Also, the Santander account was sold as "free forever" on the understanding that it was a very basic account with negligible "customer service" - and the customer service really has been shockingly bad, but I accepted that when it was free. Not at £7.50 per month!

philmanimp

Hi all, I opened my business account with Abbey in October 2004 and have been watching this thread in the hope something can be done about Santander not keeping to the advertised promise of 'free forever'. I have just had a look at my old paperwork and brochure that I still have and the first few pages of the account brochure say... "Give me one good reason... Free business banking... not for 12 months, 18 months or even two years... but forever" Then on page 6 it says... "Free business banking - what's the catch?... Many banks offer free or low-cost banking. But we're different: we don't impose time limits or insist on a minimum balance. So long as you stay within the number of transactions shown in the table overleaf - and 90% of our customers do - then you'll enjoy free current account banking forever. That's guaranteed, unless there are any changes to the law or to banking regulations, or any new taxes relating to bank charges. If you do happen to go over the limit, you'll only pay bank charges on the transactions that exceed it. This represents a big financial advantage to new and growing businesses with other priorities - like buying computers or making sure there's enough put aside to pay the VAT bill." Ok - so that is what there blurb said - no other small print on the brochure apart from microscopic print on the back page saying full terms available upon request. Let's hope we can get something done about this... Just about to phone them. Cheers!

tunworththunderbolt_2

I still have my sales literarature from opening the "free forever" business account and I quote "We guarantee that unless there are any changes to the law or banking regulations, or any new taxes relating to bank charges, you will benefit from free day to day business banking forever"
I called the Santander Helpline who said they 'could no longer afford to offer free banking' - and that is my problem why?
The script from which the operator was reading then said the usual "in your t&Cs we can do anything with 30 days notice"!
I have reported this to the FSA who were aware of the issue, so the more that contact the FSA the better
I rang Santander back and closed all my other accounts and cards, when asked why I told them I would not deal with an organisation that I could not trust and referenced free forever. He commented "Oh yes we do know about that"
Take action do not let another Bank get away with the most blatent mis-selling

bordercars

free forever, i was told.

now they want me to pay for an online account that has NO branch customer services.

and this in the week the govt minister wants to cut down on CASH in HAND.

im a taxi driver, almost all cash. bank it...i think not.


Business Current Account
Transaction Monthly limit Charges above the limit
Cash deposits (see note 3) £3,000 £0.50 per £100
Cheque deposits (see note 4) 100 £0.50 per item
Cash withdrawals 100 £0.50 per item
Cheque withdrawals 100 £0.50 per item
BACS credits Free and unlimited N/A
Debit card payments Free and unlimited N/A
Direct Debits, standing orders,
bill payments Free and unlimited N/A
Transfers between linked
accounts Free and unlimited N/A
Monthly fee £0
Monthly transaction limits start on the monthly anniversary of the date your account was opened. For example, if you
opened your account on 24 January, your monthly transaction limits start on the 24th of each month and run until the
23rd of the following month. This will become your statement date. If you decide to change your statement date then
the charging period will change accordingly.

ALynch

I have just got the original paperwork from 2002 from my files, it states quite clearly "FREE BANKING FOREVER" see note 1

Note 1 states "subject to relevant changes to law, regulation or the imposition of any tax in connection with bank charges"

Can anyone tell me what has changed in law or tax that should impose any charges on a Free Banking Forever account.

If anyone would like a copy of the original documents I will gladly supply this to them.

They are stating £7.50 per month currently what happens when Santander change teir minds on this and increase this charge to £20.00 next year or £50.00 the year after.

My opinion and that's all it is They are Desperate to raise funds, not give a better service, I have no problem with the current service therefore if clients want more change your bank account to one that gives what they want and let them suffer the charges.

Irishorangutan

I haven't received my letter yet but I am most displeased with this!!

bordercars

what service.

my hole in the wall wasnt working, DD's due asked if i could pay cash in, NO said clerk so it's a 30 mile trip to next branch.

if it was a branch bank fair do's . but it's an online bank.

done a quick bit of research CoOp is free for 18 months then £3 month for my requirements.

Santander big mistake, im only little but have had a balance of around £3k full time with a almost zero interest rate, thats where you make youre money, along with the X working days to clear cheques etc.

Paulgonnabedebtfree

MJPS wrote: »

I like many of you phoned Santander's help line and was fobbed off. I asked them to ensure that they recorded my complaint. I am a member of the Federation of Small Businesses and one of the benefits is free banking with the Co-op. The membership fee of £120 per year sounds a lot but one of the many possible benefits is that they will handle an investigation by HMRC if you are unlucky enough to suffer one. As Santander are about to renege on free banking I am in the process of moving to the Co-op. The customer service person who filled in the application forms over the phone could not have been more helpful. I would suggest all 230,000 businesses to look at the FSB website to see if membership is right for them.

I went down the same route as you quite a while ago. I now have two business accounts for one business. I was pretty much forced into this by Santander's incompetence i.e. they would not display the references on incoming BACS payments. So the BACS payments go to Co-op (who DO show the references) and the expensive paper transaction (cash and cheques) are deposited at Santander. I live near a branch and can make those deposits via ATM out of hours. So, due to their own incompetence, they now only get my paper business and none of the cheap electronic business. They have since fixed the BNACS reference issue. It took them about two years I think - tim e when I would hasve had to guess which customer had made a payment. I had a complaint about that too but decided not tgo follow it up and to do BACS elsewhere as I was getting very frustrated about it.