TSB Value Added Accounts

paulcass67

Does anybody else out there pay for a TSB Value Added Account (Silver, Gold etc.)?


I do - I have the pleasure of paying £25 month for a Premier Account (that TSB no longer sell) that gives me Credit Report Alerts, Mobile Phone insurance, Travel Insurance, "Sentinel" Card Protection, Breakdown etc. etc.


All of this extra stuff used to be available in my TSB on-line banking... so, for example, I could get a credit report to see who's been searching my details, if I bought I new mobile phone I could add the IMEI number & upload a copy of the receipt etc. or if I got a new card I could add the account number online.


Since their disastrous IT upgrade in April all of these features have disappeared from my on-line banking and so I have to phone up, answer seventy three automated "voice detection" security questions, wait in a queue (whilst listening to soothing messages about how important I am) and then, when eventually speaking to a human (after answering 27 security questions I've already answered once) you can "access" your value added benefits!


I thought it was just me that could no longer access these things online - so I raised this with TSB in May. The nice person I spoke to was stumped and suggested it was a bug that needed passing to "IT". I heard nothing and so after a tortuous experience trying to establish over the phone who'd accessed my Credit Report (TSB sent me an Alert text) I raised a formal complaint with them. TSB failed to acknowledge my complaint so after a couple of months I raised a 2nd complaint, again this was unacknowledged after several weeks.


So last month I gave up and referred it all to the FOS (who I might add have been brilliant in terms of timely response and general communication).


FOS have now found in my favour and told TSB to compensate me for the impact this has had, but as part of the response TSB sent to the FOS they've said they're unable to confirm if the value added services will be made available in their Internet Banking again!!!


I thought it was a bug that only affected me - but it seems that everybody who pays extra for this value added stuff is enjoying this degraded service and having to do everything over the phone?!


It might just be me being grumpy, but I simply cannot bring myself to endure the whole joyful call centre experience to let TSB know about the new credit card I got in the summer.

I can't believe that TSB think it's ok to simply delete functionality & convenience as part of an "upgrade" (ignoring what was sold to customers) yet carry on charging the same amount and hope that nobody notices!

eskbanker

I can imagine that, given the well-publicised difficulties they had with maintaining core banking functionality, availability of some relatively peripheral administrative capabilities for legacy packaged accounts in their online banking won't be seen as a priority, but, yes, I'm sure that's not much consolation!

Personally I'd vote with my feet and reconsider whether a packaged account is worth having at all and if so, which of TSB's competitors offers the best value for money: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/banking/best-packaged-bank-accounts/