First Direct - 20 minute phone quiz now needed to open savings account

mgdavid

Mr_Goodkat wrote: »

It's not really cutting off my nose to spite my face more a decision that a 20 minute plus telephone interrogation ......

it's not an interrogation - read post #17

GingerBob_3

EDF used to force you to listen to 15 minutes of T&Cs if and when you changed your energy tariff. They don't do that anymore. I guess they learnt their lesson. Perhaps FD will learn a similar lesson in due course.


FD/HSBC are rapidly becoming a very difficult organisation to deal with. Maybe it's time to go elsewhere for banking services.

Mr_Goodkat

mgdavid wrote: »

it's not an interrogation - read post #17

OK, maybe it is not an interrogation but it is certainly an unnecessary amount of time and bureaucracy to open a regular savings account.


I switched my mortgage deal recently, all completed online without speaking to anyone - if a bank can agree that several hundreds of thousands of pounds of their money can be trusted to me at a lower rate than they currently charge me without needing anything more than a online application and a few clicks FD needing 20 minutes to establish if I can give them £300 a month is an absolute joke and a sure fire way of losing customers.

Carolinemjs

Most of the time was taken up by reading out terms and conditions, statutory info etc, and by my interruptions to query points. The actual time taken with personal questions was very short and not in anyway intrusive, though totally unnecessary considering I'm already an account holder. There were a couple of pieces of information that needed updating which had not been picked up previously.

Not really so bad and not an interrogation

Doc_N

Mr_Goodkat wrote: »

.......an absolute joke and a sure fire way of losing customers.

Well it's certainly lost a couple of customers in this family! This is the second time in the last 18 months I've had to post about First Direct's timewasting new procedures.

The other one was this, and it involved making long-established customers send them certified ID documents (at the customer's cost) instead of offering an option to visit a branch of HSBC:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5037121

This time, having listened to one of these latest 'conversations', it's very difficult to understand why a longstanding customer wanting to open another Regular Saver account to replace an old one, should be asked to give details of monthly income and monthly outgoings.

Absolutely understandable for a loan or a mortgage advance, but for a savings account?

I find all this quite incredible. Almost as if they've allowed work experience students in with a specific brief of seeing how many customers they can lose in a given time. 25 years of problem-free banking with what's always been an excellent bank - absolutely customer-centric - and now it seems to have completely forgotten how important it is to keep customers happy. I was, until recently, a very positive FD customer, recommending it to anyone. I can't do that any more.

Vortigern

Carolinemjs wrote: »

Most of the time was taken up by reading out terms and conditions, statutory info etc,

I find this procedure insulting. It seems to imply that I can't read the terms for myself, or that I'm lying when I say that I have read them.

If/when they subject me to this rigamarole I'll point out that I've read the terms online, I'll repeat that assertion no more than twice, and then try very hard to suppress a theatrical snore.

Halifax subjected me to a video presentation of terms a while back. I can't remember any of it, so that's not a very effective method of communicating.

GingerBob_3

It occurred to me that maybe HSBC is trying to close down FD by stealth. Making it hard work to be a customer is certainly one way of achieving this.

Archi_Bald

This sort of thing is quite likely the direct result of thousands of people claiming compo because they say they were never told this or that or the other, and the FCA holding the banks' feet to the fire over mis-selling all sorts of stuff. Prepare for even more of it, and not just at FD.

Mr_Goodkat

Archi_Bald wrote: »

This sort of thing is quite likely the direct result of thousands of people claiming compo because they say they were never told this or that or the other, and the FCA holding the banks' feet to the fire over mis-selling all sorts of stuff. Prepare for even more of it, and not just at FD.

If it is a result of the above then FD in this instance and other banks if they follow are overly cautious and the regulator needs to put down some guidelines on what needs to be applied and when - a regular saver does not require this!


I just don't see a miss selling angle on a regular saver:


The sums are small £25 - £300 PCM so maximum of £3,600 PA
The money is not actually locked away it is accessible
The only potential loss for a customer is accessing the money early and getting a much lower rate on the money they saved
Information and T&C's about the regular save are very clear
FD don't seem to actively sell the regular saver it is a customer decision either online or through telephone banking to open one

Archi_Bald

Mr_Goodkat wrote: »

I just don't see a miss selling angle on a regular saver:

Neither do I. But then I wouldn't buy things like a bank account that comes with a monthly fee that is of no benefit to me, and several years down the line claim I didn't know there were accounts that cost nothing, and therefore claiming all my money back with huge interest added to it.

Consumers have proven that they are very resourceful when it comes to claiming compo. Banks got a bit bored with it, I reckon.