Great 'Work in a bank? What should we know' Hunt

Tootsie_Roll

Paul_Herring wrote: »

How does "not breaking any [employer] rules" come under the category of "gross misconduct"?

It's an oxymoron - you can't divulge that level of information without commiting an act of gross misconduct (I think Martin is well aware of that )

Not quite the same as Tesco's staff telling us what's on special offer this week.

Lost24

Hi there, This is my first post!!! (But I've been reading MSE for a long time!)

I used to work for HSBC and can confirm a couple of things as mentioned above : -

1) Customer Reviews are just for sales for the banks, and the process used was pretty similar as Convenience101 laid out! A credit score is carried out at these also!

2) Cheque Clearing Process - as Ferrett said also!

3) CS/frontline staff are given targets to sell a certain amount of certain product in a monthly period - at your 6monthly review if you don't perform you may not get your annual salary increment!

4) At my time every customer should have five products with HSBC - i.e. Current a/c, Savings a/c, Home Ins, Credit Card, Life Ins, Pension, Loan etc. etc. take your pick!!!

I worked for this bank for over 10 years, and just couldn't do it any more - I used to love my job and had progressed really well but it became more and more about sales and profit than customer service!

mrmajika

I am an employee of Lloyds TSB, so the following holds true for LTSB, but may also be true of other high street banks.


When applying for a loan, if you have seen a better rate elsewhere, tell them. Provided you can give the name of the company, the APR and the monthly repayments then rates can be lowered to match or beat the competitor offer.

To avoid an early settlement fee on a loan, pay all but the last month's direct debit amount off. Overpayments are penalty free, but an early settlement fee applies if paying the loan off in full.

And Finally...

To stop a cheque that is lost / lost in post is free. To stop a cheque for any other reason there is a £10 charge.


Should anything else spring to mind then i'll add later.

Cheers

dianadors

I used to work for a bank on telephone loan applications. When you call for a loan, they try and cross sell you other products(like credit cards etc) and also "upsell" the loan amount (so you only want 5K but they discover that you have 5K on another banks credit card so they offer you 10K loan etc). They also make more money on the repayment protection than the loan itself so thats why they really push it. They use rapport building sales techniques to get you to trust them so that you think what they suggest is a great idea. When I was there, we were heavily targeted on cross sell, upsell and PPI sales. I think its wise to remember that no bank has your best interest at heart.

BWZN93

I work for Nationwide Building Society, and in all honesty I enjoy my job. I feel that it is one of the better financial services providers in the UK - its a mutual, charges overall are less than other high street providers (for instance, loans, credit cards and overdrafts are cheaper than the high streets, and savings rates are generally better on a like for like comparison (i.e - no stupid terms and conditions to actually get the rate advertised!), some things are not charged for (use your card abroad, cheque withdrawals over the counter and cancelling cheques, for instance) and the culture is better for employees (I used to work for Natwest too and the training and opportunities are better in Nationwide, as well as staff morale).

Granted, it is harder to get full facilities with a current account for instance because of the credit scoring system - as a smaller organisation the level of risk involved has to be lower than what natwest etc can offer, but in general the products are better and I honestly feel that the service is better too because of the training available to staff. When I worked at Natwest we read a couple of leaflets on products then were put straight to work.

Some things are more efficient however, I know staff in Barclays and RBS and we have swapped info on how things work. I can say for sure that if fraud hits your account then you will get your money back quicker than if you banked with any other high street provider - we average 48hrs for a return, RBS can take 6 weeks. Not cool if you have your mortgage to pay! Secondly, getting your money back from a direct debit - RBS has told me on my personal account they wont claim it back on my behalf and I had to claim it off the company who took it - which practically ignores the Direct Debit Guarantee! We get it back in your account in 24hours.

Thats not to say there arent problems - rapid growth and re-organisation has meant that there arent enough staff - this should be addressed by the Portman/Nationwide merger due at the end of August (subject to approval by the FSA). Whilst some Portman or Nationwide branches will be closed as a result - this is only because there is a branch of either remaining open within a very short distance so access to a branch will not be affected (despite what SOME high street banks have claimed! Naughty!). It simply doesnt make sense to have TWO branches of Nationwide within 300yards of each other!

My only complaint with working for Nationwide is that some customers expectations simply cannot be met, who then complain and say they will take their account elsewhere when they will encounter the same problem at ANY finanical institution in the UK - such as ID requirements, over the counter withdrawal limits, what exactly constitutes a driving licence for ID (its the PAPER AND THE CARD PART!!!), high value transactions and their ID requirements, the Data Protection Act, and many more. As we deal with money and personal information, im not going to simply hand out any of it without being sure I can because a) ill lose my job b) be fined personally, and c) bring my employer into disrepute. Whilst it means customers may encounter inconvenience when dealing with their own account - how much more pee'd off would you be if I let someone walk out with your entire wage packet. Id suggest it would be mighty annoyed at the very least.

In a similar vein - please dont take it out on staff if you are annoyed with a Nationwide Policy - the staff serving you didnt make it up and are probably as frustrated as you are! Ask for it to be noted which the staff will gladly do on the member service log (which actually is read and acted upon at head office). As an example - I once had a woman and her daughter, who wanted to make a £10000 transfer from the daughters to the mothers account. The daughter was 14 and had lost her card, and had no ID, however, mother insisted it had to be done anyway. Sorry lady - no card, no id, then no transfer. This is because if there is no card/book present during a transaction then it is put on an audit listing, which can only be signed off if full ID is taken at the time and a new card/book is ordered. Even then, the maximum withdrawal/transfer/cheque amount is £500 (- the same branch cash withdrawal limit unless pre-ordered). If they arent signed off the the branch fails its audit requirements and then we get a lot of trouble in the branch.

With regards to charges, Nationwide is taking a strong no refunds policy and to go through the process as described on here for instance will lead to your account being closed. Nationwide prides itself on its customer relationships and this is seen as an irreparable breakdown of this relationship (or so I read in a Newspaper).

Aside from that - any questions just holler!

Jo x

MarcGJ

Tootsie_Roll wrote: »

It's an oxymoron - you can't divulge that level of information without commiting an act of gross misconduct (I think Martin is well aware of that )

It's not an oxymoron.

'Free Banking'. THAT'S an oxymoron.

chesky369

'supermarket staff, tell us your reduction policy' and 'disguised own brand' hunts,

um, sorry to go off topic but is there a link to this thread - I missed it and now can't seem to find it.

System

Tootsie_Roll wrote: »

It's an oxymoron - you can't divulge that level of information without commiting an act of gross misconduct (I think Martin is well aware of that )

Not quite the same as Tesco's staff telling us what's on special offer this week.

If you don't like the thread - DON'T READ IT!

UNDERGROUND

formerbankcashier

I recently resigned from the Natwest (part of the RBS group) as a cashier. I left because I was disgusted with their unscrupulous sales approach. As a humble cashier I had only a basic insight into how they worked.

Three tips:

1) Don't blame the staff - they are under ENORMOUS pressure from management to get sales leads! That said...
2) One of the banks favourite customers are people making minimum payment on their credit cards -any credit cards.

It was compulsory for me as the cashier processing the credit card minimum payment to approach the customer to ask if they would be interested in talking to a Customer Advisor (sales person!) about turning the credit card debt into a loan.

It didn't matter how many times the customer had been approached before, my manager told me if the customer complained about being harrassed, it should be logged as a customer complaint which was fine, as we are targeted on logging a minimum number of customer complaints per week!

Tip: for a quiet life - just say firmly 'no thanks' - the cashier approaching you almost certainly does NOT want to approach you - but they are required to do so as a condition of their employment. If they persist, then complain. This will cost them many, many minutes after you have gone, in logging your complaint! Make sure you insist that they DO log your complaint. They won't like that at all! It's a lot of work!

3) Bank charges. The bank are very sneaky... If you overdraw without an agreed facility - or you go over the facility - they will automatically charge you £28 for going overdrawn. They won't necessarily tell you about this charge until you get your statement.

Here's the sneaky bit: Suppose you are overdrawn by an end of month direct debit - which if they decline it they charge you £38!. If this causes you to be overdrawn at the end of the month - that raised a £28 charge. THEN if your don't notice - 3 to 5 days later, your account rolls into the next monthly business period, (which is NOT the end of the month, but a few days later) and if you are STILL overdrawn - they will raise another £28 charge!

Furthermore: these £28 charges are raised a month in arrears! So when you finally get a statement telling you they are going to charge you the £28 at the end of that month, just be aware, there may be ANOTHER £28 charge waiting for you the following month! For being overdrawn for about 5 days at the wrong time of month!

Example: A direct debit for £20 is declined on January 30th. They raise an immediate charge of £38 for declining the DD. This causes you to be overdrawn by say £10.

When you get your statement on February 5th it shows you were overdrawn, the £38 charge and your account overdrawn by £10. It will advise you that a £28 charge will be taken at the end of February for being overdrawn in January.

BUT between January 30th and February 5th, the bank changed business periods. AND if you didn't notice and you were still overdrawn by the time of the statement - (5th February) - then when you get your March 5th statement they will advise you of ANOTHER £28 charge for being overdrawn in February! See?

What's more, if you forget the £28 charge coming out at the end of February. and it causes you to overdraw again... the whole charging cycle begins all over again!

I told you it was sneaky!

One final point - its a few months since I left - so things might have changed - even the Bank Branch Managers have NO power to refund charges if you complain about them! UNLESS it's a clear 'Bank Error' - they took away discretionary refunds some time ago - because it was costing too much! Now, that may have changed since I left as I say, but when I was there, they were taking discretionary refunds away from the local branches and tightening up the rules at their lending/charging centres where the decision is taken.

Tip: So I suggest, don't waste your time and effort complaining at branch level about your charges. They can't help you. (unless as I said, it is definitely a bank error). Write to them using the templates Martin has published.

wyse_2

convenience101 wrote: »

IF YOU ARE AN RBS CUSTOMER, PLEASE READ THIS!

Some of you will be more surprised than others to read this! When your branch cold calls you and 'invites' you in for a "Customer Service Review", beware!

Lloyds TSB do the same. Both accounts my partner and I have with them were opened before the newer, stricter, anti-money laundering regulations were brought in and our "customer service" review a few years ago consisted of them asking dozens of questions to update their database to satisfy these regulations. As he knew we weren't the sort to be sold anything, the guy finished his questioning, sat there and said, "right, is there anything I can help you with today?".

We were livid and everytime someone has had the misfortune to offer us something similar since they have been told exactly what we think of them!