Natwest Offset - Eligible current accounts?

choc_mouse

I have a Select Current Account and Natwest Offset Mortgage. My Select Current Account was included in my offset arrangement for almost a year until yesterday when I received a letter to say it has been removed from the offset arrangement, completely out of the blue.

I called Natwest Offset team who said the Select current account is not eligible. The somewhat impolite agent said, only current plus and black accounts are eligible for offset.

Yet:

What type of current account can I link to an Offset Flexible Mortgage?

You can link a Select, Select Silver, Black Account, Current Plus, The Private Bank Account, Advantage Private, Advantage Gold or Graduate account to an Offset Flexible Mortgage. If you have eligible business accounts, these can also be used.

- Common questions: http://www.natwest.com/personal/mortgages/g1/offset-flexible.ashx#

Current plus - I understand you cannot apply for this anymore as replaced by the Select account range.
Black accounts - is a premium account, requiring salary of £100,000/year.

Anyone can shed any light on this? The agent was adamant this has been the case all the time even when I read the website out to him.

I escalated to a complaint and waiting for a callback but agent was keen to hang up before I gave him my full mobile number. So I wonder if and when they will call.

Update
I just sent a full written complaint to Natwest. Either their website (and what they sold me) is wrong or their agent is wrong. I'll share any reply I get.

DVardysShadow

You are doing the right thing, checking your facts and raising the matter in writing. Nothing really to add until you get a response, unless anyone else has been through the same and got any result.

choc_mouse

So I got a call from a Natwest complaints handler today.

Basically what the agent told me on the phone was wrong. So wrong that I should even expect a letter in the post to confirm my select account is not eligible for offset! THIS IS WRONG. The lady that called me just now confirmed the Select current account IS eligible, told me to ignore the letter when it arrives and apologised for this. She agreed with my complaint after listening to a recording of the call and I accepted this could be dealt with as a training issue with the agent's line manager.

The more important issue is what's gone wrong with my account. This needs further investigation and seems to be a technical problem with my account that only I would have picked up. There was no human element, as far as they could see, that triggered my offset from being removed. They will get back to me on this but promised I won't be out of pocket for their error.

I asked for this in writing too.

choc_mouse

1 month on. No calls, no letters, nothing. So I called Natwest and they had no log of the lady calling me on 29th August and I would need to contact the mortgage team again.

Next step: Full complaint, registered post, with blow by blow account of everything that has happened, screenshots of the website, copies of all letters/emails and hope that someone can make sense of it and figure out what's gone wrong. Also implied that their time is running out before I can take this to FOS.

Jimbo1976

When you called recently did they acknowledge that they had received your original complaint? They should have logged it somewhere.

I can only assume that the person you spoke to felt they had resolved your complaint (even if they did not make the changes necessary to your account). It is unfathomable that this person did not record their actions.

You have done the right thing in sending in all the correspondence.

If the firm has not dealt with your complaint satisfactorily within 8 weeks you can take it to FoS. Use the original date of your initial complaint as the start date.

choc_mouse

Yes, they said they had a log of my original complaint (on 25th Aug) but not of their follow up call on the 29th Aug.

The person who called me on 29th Aug said they needed more time to investigate, which is why I have been waiting patiently.

I'll update here if there's any progress from NatWest.

choc_mouse

After a lot of waiting, someone at NatWest has managed to sort this all out for me. It turns out it all originated out of "human error" resulting in me possessing two customer IDs (internal identifier for Natwest to identify customers). This resulted in my offset accounts being unlinked.

All looks to be resolved now and got interest adjusted + £200 compensation.

Conclusion: Select Current Account CAN be added to the offset arrangement despite what some useless NatWest staff say.