Complaint following switch

abydam

I recently switched my current account from Nationwide to First Direct - mainly due to the high esteem it's held in by Martin's Money users.

It wasn't the smoothest transition. Despite entering all my bank details on the First Direct online form, I was told that these had not been received by the First Direct switch team despite me receiving all the paperwork in the post. Where had this information gone?

Following setting up the new account, I was sent an email with my new account details and asked to confirm a switch date. I rang up the customer service line to do this, but was then informed that First Direct had accidentally sent my new account details to THREE other customers. I was told there was no reason to worry security wise and that they had spoken to three customers who had deleted the email.

Following this, I made complaint through the online form on the website. I have not received a reply or acknowledgement of this - 4 weeks after submitting.

I'm planning to contact them directly tomorrow and would like to know how best to express my unhappiness with the service. Should I escalate this on to the Information Commission? Ombudsman?

Is there compensation available for a breach like this?

SuperHan

Service the account for 6 months then claim the leaving bonus.

But you will have to complain to the bank and wait 8 weeks for a resolution before escalating to any ombudsman type service.

abydam

Chased this up over the weekend as was offered £150 compensation for the error. Always worth complaining!