Halifax incentive £200 to switch?

London18

I've been offered £200 by Halifax to switch to their Reward Current account, which gives £5 per month as well. This is presumably as I have other products with them. The usual account rules will apply; pay in at least £750 per month, have at least 2 DD's and stay in credit (i.e. no overdraft unless I apply seperately for one). All of which I can do. The catch is they will close my First Direct account on switching.

I do really like FD customer service, they been excellent when I had card cloning fraud once, replacing a debit card when it got randomly eaten by an ATM, and in tracking some mystery transactions. So I was wondering what the Halifax telephone customer service is like? I have barely used their telephone services, mainly just gone on line. I guess it would have to be quite bad to pass up £200!

I have until 31 August to apply so looking for feedback from Halifax customers.

Thanks!

Archi_Bald

Which Branch offers £200? As all the advertisements and the website say it is £100.

Personally, I would not give up FD because I want access to their Regular Savings account. But I would also not be without the Halifax Reward account as I like the monthly fivers.

I wouldn't use either FD or Halifax as my regular current account, though, as I prefer to use the 123 as it pays me interest and cashback.

If you desperately want to keep your FD but also want to get the Reward account, you need to get yourself a donor account which you can switch.

London18

Thanks ArchiiBald,

I got a personalised letter from Halifax. It says "you've been selected to get an extra £100 when you switch ........You'll get £200 that's £100 more than our usual offer". So I'm assuming it's an attempt to get existing customers with other products to take out the Reward account as well.

Problem is I don't think I have time to set up a donor account in time to switch since it to Halifax as the letter says I only have until 31st to apply. As I've not opened a current account for years I have no idea how long that takes these days, will look into it though.

I have looked at the 123 account as well for the same reasons you state and either way may still apply for one of those if I can manage the funding complexities of having 2 accounts at once.

karlie88

Archi_Bald wrote: »

Which Branch offers £200? As all the advertisements and the website say it is £100.

Personally, I would not give up FD because I want access to their Regular Savings account. But I would also not be without the Halifax Reward account as I like the monthly fivers.

I wouldn't use either FD or Halifax as my regular current account, though, as I prefer to use the 123 as it pays me interest and cashback.

If you desperately want to keep your FD but also want to get the Reward account, you need to get yourself a donor account which you can switch.

Some people have been getting these on HUKD too.

Here's a copy of the letter; thanks to adamos - HUKD:



As mentioned, a personalised letter.

Would have been great if it was offered on their website.

YorkshireBoy

London18 wrote: »

if I can manage the funding complexities of having 2 accounts at once.

:rotfl:

You should try it with 20+ accounts!...or maybe not.

London18

No, maybe not YorkshireBoy! I am impressed. From expeience I know am not good at keeping track of accounts, rates and balances. Even when I do decide to change things around, have a tendency to overanalyse, dither, then do nothing as the fallback option. Trying to improve in that area now, (must try harder) but know my limits!

colsten

If you are under time pressure, perhaps you can switch your First Direct account now, and then open one later on again? £200 would tempt me quite seriously.

First Direct won't pay you to join them again but they won't mind if you open another account with them - credit check allowing, of course.

Although, tbh, the First Direct Customer Service supremacy is seriously overhyped, IMO. Halifax will be just fine. All banks will be just fine, perhaps with the exception of Natwest/RBS who do indeed have a pretty dire reputation for sorting out any issues.

London18

Thanks Colsten, that's what I was looking for, people's opinions on the service versus the money. £200 tempts me to! I think I'd be mad not to really, it's free money and as you say can always go back to FD if I wanted to.

YorkshireBoy

London18 wrote: »

that's what I was looking for, people's opinions on the service versus the money.

When you have many accounts with many providers there's bound to be an increase in 'problems'. However, I've had cause to make far more complaints to Halifax than I have to any of my other providers. Fortunately, as well as putting things right, they also pay handsome goodwill.


Probably why I continue to use them as my (real) 'main bank', for both receiving my salary and paying most of my bills.

zerog

Opening an account online is very quick if you can pass the electronic checks. I would suggest the Tesco current account, along with which you can open 2 online savers to set up 2 direct debits. If you only need to start the switch by 31 August, it would be possible to get this done in time.

.1xp

Personally, I feel Halifax are much better in many ways than FD.

Online banking is 110% better.

I've found them to be pretty good since joining.

Telephone banking as also improved immensely over time (I like being able to say in my own words why I'm calling, to then be put through to the relevant department without having to press lot's of numbers)

Once the security number is set up for telephone banking too, it speeds everything up too.

Only thing I think they have missing is online secure messaging and some poor savings rates.

I think FD are way overrated and really not what they were when they first came out.