Abbey - problems with online banking & ATMs

saxmund

I have just managed to get through on the 01908 number and, without having to wait too long in the queue, was able to transfer enough money to last me until payday. The very helpful chap on the phone said he didn't know how long it would last, and they had a similar outage a couple of weeks ago which lasted 2-3 days (and which I was unaware of as presumably I didn't try to use e-banking at the time). Which begs the question that if it's some sort of planned maintenance and it's causing known problems why they can't warn us in advance? I could have easily made my transfer before the weekend. I'm expecting a cheque from the sale of my endowment in the next few days and if my e-saver is effectively unusable I'm going to lose interest, although admittedly only for a short period before I pay it into the mortgage and an ISA.

bargains83

saxmund wrote: »

I have just managed to get through on the 01908 number and, without having to wait too long in the queue, was able to transfer enough money to last me until payday. The very helpful chap on the phone said he didn't know how long it would last, and they had a similar outage a couple of weeks ago which lasted 2-3 days (and which I was unaware of as presumably I didn't try to use e-banking at the time). Which begs the question that if it's some sort of planned maintenance and it's causing known problems why they can't warn us in advance? I could have easily made my transfer before the weekend. I'm expecting a cheque from the sale of my endowment in the next few days and if my e-saver is effectively unusable I'm going to lose interest, although admittedly only for a short period before I pay it into the mortgage and an ISA.

The problems are far deeper than that as well, debit card transactions in current accounts which should have shown up on monday/tuesday (when this problem started) aren't showing up and money is being re-made available to spend even though it will eventually be re-taken. I have about £1k in debit card transactions waiting to appear on the statement and that amount is now back on my 'available balance' so people need to be very careful with their spending as there is the posibility of being severely overdrawn and being charged for the privelage.

saxmund

I don't have any debit card payments in the pipeline, although I an wondering if a credit card payment I made at the weekend will go through. If debit card payments aren't being posted it's quite serious and makes Abbey's seeming inability (or unwillingness) to let people know what's going on all the more reprihensible.

Paul_Herring

Well it's starting to make the news: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/05/23/abbey_banking_outage/

Register wrote:

An Abbey spokeswoman told The Register that the problems were not security-related, and had been caused by maintenance and upgrade work. The bank sent us this statement:

We are experiencing a technical problem with our internet banking service today.[...]

The firm's technical support line says customers will be "unable to use internet banking".

Hapless_2

Those of us with a basic bank account can't even take money out over the counter or pay cheques in if the atms go down as well!
Other banks atms were only letting me draw £50 at a time (part of the "glitch" apparently) so I have been unable to pay the rent until today.

saxmund

Actually I went past an Abbey branch during my lunchtime walk and there was hardly anyone in it - so maybe I should have turned to that for my transfer. However, I assumed there'd be a long queue, and I didn't really have the time the last couple of days.

PBA

Abbey are in the process of moving from their 20+ year old building society IT system to a brand new one. Some transactions will be unavailable at times because of it. Any transactions that you'd normally do online can be done over the phone (08459 724724) or over the counter in branch.

All over the counter transactions, Visa purchases, cash machine deposits and withdrawals are working fine!

movine

Thanks everyone. I'm having problems as i've soon got to transfer money from my esaver account for a house purchase. Why the hell can't they just tell us there's a problem? We keep on logging on, entering all the details only to be told service not available. As for the phone ditto; I am starting to feel really crosser than a very cross thing in an extremily cross contest. If it would do any good i will move my account when this is all over but are the others any better?

saxmund

And guess what... the "really helpful guy" moved my money the wrong way, so I now have an extra £1000 in my savings account and I'm really overdrawn on my current account. Grrr... The opportunity for this sort of misunderstanding is of course just why I prefer not to use telephone banking!

Piersight

The Abbey has had problems all week and it's still not allowing transfers today, Friday. Worse, personal banking shows a different balance on the statement from that on the account summary page! And the support desk don't know when the services will be working again!