MSE News: Co-op, Halifax and Lloyds customers hit by banking chaos

opinions4u

Pincher wrote: »

The problem is redundancy (back up) costs money. In order to qualify for free banking, you need to keep a minimum amount in the account, or charges start appearing. You also need to pay-in a minimum amount every month. I find two current accounts enough of a handful already, and certainly don't have thousands to sit in more current accounts just to keep them free banking.

Strange that.

Most UK bank accounts don't charge fees for low funding or low balances.

innovate

opinions4u wrote: »

Strange that.

Most UK bank accounts don't charge fees for low funding or low balances.

Even if they did, you could cycle the same money through all of them on Standing Orders, to satisfy the minimum funding requirements. If you include Halifax in the cycling, you even get paid for it. I don't know of any UK current account that requires a minimum balance.

MoneySaverLog

The only one I have that requires funding £500 a month is HSBC and that will probably get closed when my regular saver matures as they have dropped their interest rate to 4% for new customers which is not competitive anymore with plenty of regular savers offering the same with no hoops to jump through.

Pincher

Pay-in monthly/Minimum Balance

First Direct is £1,500/£1,500
Nationwide is £750/£0
HSBC £500/

First Direct

Banking with first direct usually costs £10 a month, but we'll waive the fee if you pay in at least £1,500 to your 1st Account each month, maintain an average monthly 1st Account balance of £1,500, or hold a selected first direct additional product. Take a look at our interest rates and charges section for more details of other eligible accounts.



Nationwide FlexAccount
==================

You lose the European Travel Insurance if you don't pay-in £750 monthly.


I seem to remember Santander 123 and Halifax had some loops to jump through as well.

In any case, let us say you do keep £1 in three out of four accounts, with £750 hopping around the accounts. When your main account, i.e. the one with the money in, gets frozen by IT problem, what is the use of three bank accounts with £1 in them? For the extra accounts to be useful, they have to have SOME money in them.

Mockingjay

Just to follow up, I complained to Halifax regarding Friday & they were smashing! It was all due to a power cut & their backup system failed to kick in.

Anyway I have been compensated & I'm very happy with how they dealt with my complaint

NittyGritty

in what way did they compensate you?

Spendthrifter

I recently started to use Halifax Online Banking. When I first logged in on 5.9.12 I had access to my Current, ISA Saver Variable and ISA Investor accounts. 4 weeks ago the ISA Investor Account vanished from the online banking site without trace - it has not re-appeared. For 4 weeks only the balance amount but no statements have been available for the ISA Saver Variable, plus the bland statement "Sorry, your statement is not available online at the moment. We're working hard to get this resolved as soon as possible. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause you". Last week, local branch staff were not aware of these problems and had to phone Halifax OnlineHelp Desk. Having done so they shrugged their shoulders and said that the problems were due to "merging IT systems with Lloyds". I cannot find any acknowledgement of the problem by Halifax, let alone an explanation or an apology - or any indication when I might once again be able to manage my Halifax accounts online.

Mockingjay

They refunded the cost of my phone calls to them on Friday (£8), petrol (£5) and the £1 I had to leave in the trolley. The chap on the phone (unprompted) offered me £25 which I accepted.

(Text removed by MSE Forum Team)

wiseshark

These bank glitches are becoming more frequent, therefore always bring a back up card. either debit or credit.

Remember Northern Rock.
Remember Argentina.

I especially remember October 2008 and the then Labour Government SH***ING themselves as it was 'touch and go' that the British Banking system might collapse. Just imagine the chaos if that were to occur and yes folks it can occur.

Since then I've put £50 each month into the safe, Just in case:D

AdamJK_2

wiseshark wrote: »

Since then I've put £50 each month into the safe, Just in case:D

The irony there being that in the event of a major banking collapse the paper money you're hoarding will be worth the same as a roll of andrex!