First Direct new web site is terrible

r-shar

Reasons to leave First Direct, the list is getting longer...
1) Horrible new website. Nothing wrong with the old one so why change it? It was simple, smart and easy to use. The new one looks like its been designed by toddlers, everything's been blown up huge and is very hard to focus on properly.
Why not give the option to switch back to the old layout? That should be standard practice when introducing a new system. Then when everyone clicks on switch back you can see what a waste of time that all was and focus on something more important, like real time balances.
2) The new website doesn't even work, When I click on the new massive grey? coloured boxes I keep getting error codes and 'its us, not you' messages. When I phone FD they put me on hold with their 'digital team' for forty minutes. Then they tell me the website is broken and offer me £20.
3)The grey writing is very difficult to use - the fonts are out of proportion with the message they are carrying - vital data is pale grey on white but unnecessary text is writ large. The icons on the left side are small and blurred.
4) You can no longer see all your accounts in a list - the top one is always open and takes up the top 25% of the screen forcing you to scroll to see all the data.
5) Fuzzy sounding waves and bird song while on hold. Its extremely irritating and makes you wonder if they are a serious, trustworthy bank, or a bunch of 12 year olds having a laugh - I am not laughing when on hold for 20 mins.

I am leaving them asap

penners324

Was a great bank 20 years ago. Their technical infrastructure hasnt moved since though.
Use Starling or Monzo, far easier to deal with, and far better apps

JAHL

I agree totally - its a disaster! Complaints on Trust Pilot are growing. One piece of recent feedback from FD on there says they are listening to the complaints and will make some changes to reflect customer views. I have just been on to check and they have made the money out column closer to the middle but its so greyed out you can barely read it. The rest of the debacle remains a mess. Very disappointing First Direct.

Brewer20

We had cause to ring FD this morning, must admit it was a frustrating time previous to our phone call but I think that's got something to do with my wife changing her android phone to the iphone.
Long story short we needed to phone them to set up a digital secure key, well it is for our/your security, it was a bit long winded but we got there in the end.
Observations, call answered immediately, kept on hold around 1 minute after a long drawn out procedure we are now finally up and running with the phone app. Call centre staff wonderfully patience in dealing with our problem. The website yes it's a little overpowering (text size) but hey you'll get use to it, no complaints here. It's not as if you are sitting in front on it for hours on end, just a few minutes maybe in a few days, what's the problem?
Account holders for 20+ yrs, no reason to swap over this minor thing.

EarthBoy

Just logged on to see what it's like. Dreadful, is the best description I can think of for it.

No_6

may be it will drop from top of the list
but people vote for it for their PHONE banking !

who uses a phone for banking ?

prob loads..... will now get complaints

eskbanker

No_6 wrote: »

may be it will drop from top of the list
but people vote for it for their PHONE banking !

No, in the most recent 'official' banking survey (published in February), First Direct came out on top specifically in the "Online and mobile banking services" section.

If, on the other hand, you were referring to the long-running (but less scientific) MSE polls, they were finally deposed from their perch in the most recent one of those, published in March.

EarthBoy

eskbanker wrote: »

No, in the most recent 'official' banking survey (published in February), First Direct came out on top specifically in the "Online and mobile banking services" section.

First Direct's rubbish app was the main reason I switched away from them last year. The rest of their customers must be brainwashed or easily pleased. They were excellent on the phone, but I don't want phone banking, I want a good app.

Vortigern

The new web interface is truly awful. Far too much white space. Not easy to see a date for each transaction - Why can't it be laid out like a paper statement?
Date/Payee/Out/In/Balance? - one line per transaction.

There's too little contrast on the login screen. It's hard to spot the boxes for the password characters. (Could be partly due to my monitor)

I'll have to try the app again - surely it can't be worse than the website?

eskbanker

EarthBoy wrote: »

First Direct's rubbish app was the main reason I switched away from them last year. The rest of their customers must be brainwashed or easily pleased. They were excellent on the phone, but I don't want phone banking, I want a good app.

I'm not saying that your opinion is wrong, or that the opinion of the majority (seemingly) is right, just observing the results of what I believe to be the most comprehensive and credible customer survey to date, in particular in response to the unsupported assertion that those admiring FD do so on the basis of their phone facilities.

Trouble with all these opinions though is that they're inherently subjective, so what works for you won't suit others and vice versa - perhaps FD is the banking world's Donald Trump (or Boris Johnson), favoured by a silent majority but roundly castigated by an incredulous vocal minority?

mgdavid

r-shar wrote: »

Reasons to leave First Direct, the list is getting longer...
1) Horrible new website. Nothing wrong with the old one so why change it? It was simple, smart and easy to use. The new one looks like its been designed by toddlers, everything's been blown up huge and is very hard to focus on properly.
Why not give the option to switch back to the old layout? That should be standard practice when introducing a new system. Then when everyone clicks on switch back you can see what a waste of time that all was and focus on something more important, like real time balances.
..........

Barclays have recently done a very similar change to online banking, what was pretty good is now just awful, and damn annoying. It's also massively slower in response time. They invited me to do a survey - big mistake, I vented !
Been with them for decades but this is so bad I may well move...