Aldemore Bank - what a shambles of a company

AndyP1957

Earlier this year my partner (now my wife) and I both opened cash isas.

My application went through within a week - hers took about 6 weeks, no communication and nothing happened until she chased them up by phone to find out why the delay. It was then confirmed within days. This was in May this year.

In June we got married, and in July she phoned to see what they needed to change her name on her account. We then paid for a solicitor to authenticate a copy of our marriage certificate and sent it to them recorded delivery.

This was 22 July - today 17 September she phoned them to see what the delay again was. They said they had heard nothing since May. My wife pointed out that she had spoken with them on the 22 July, which they then acknowledged was on record.

However adamant never received the paperwork (sadly my wife mislaid the post office receipt) and refused to offer any workable solution - email or similar. So now we have to pay the solicitor again and resend to them and hope they do not lose this next one.

There is a distinct arrogance to their attitude and most certainly have no concept of customer service or support.

I decided to post a relevant review on Trust Pilot where I discovered that 61 percent of the reviews for them were rate ONE star only.

I don't really want to keep our money with this absymal bank now, but can I transfer out to another cash isa early or do I have to wait for the Fixed Years interest period to pass - its not apparent in their paperwork what I can do.

Does anyone know the answer - thanks

bowlhead99

With any kind of a Cash ISA (instant access, notice access, fixed term), it's an HMRC rule of the product that you can get out whenever you like by simply going to your new cash ISA provider and initiating a transfer, providing the details of your existing provider and account. The new ISA manager will liaise with the existing provider to obtain the funds.

If obtaining the funds involves breaking the terms of the account (eg, you signed up to deposit money for a year fixed term with Aldermore in Apr/May and are now taking your money back before the year is up), there will invariably be an interest penalty which would be deducted before the rest of the available funds are released to the new ISA manager for him to put into his product. The penalty, which should be in the paperwork / T&C, exists so that people don't just sign up with a longer commitment to get a better rate, and then renege on it and take their money away.

On some of your other points:

- Trustpilot is not particularly useful to independently gauge quality of service, as with financial services providers most people are only going on there to moan and complain. They have a few hundred thousand accounts, and 60% of 75 'reviewers' is fewer than fifty individuals who were annoyed enough to go online and say it's a one star service. Some of them may post a fake review without even being a customer. Several hundred thousand people didn't have an issue which enraged them enough to want to go and post about it on Trustpilot. In the decade they've been running, they have won tens of industry awards (not that most awards are fully independent, and many will just be for rates rather than service level, but there are surely plenty worse providers).

- Your wife used a post office service which recorded that she delivered something to them, but then threw away the evidence without confirming with them that they had received it. If they didn't receive it, and she can't prove she sent anything to them (let alone that what she sent was what they had asked for), there is not much they can do. They will have a policy not to change a name on the account without an original or certified copy of the evidence of name change.

You say they didn't offer a workable solution to get around the problem that the document you wife said she sent, didn't get to the right person, other than getting it again and sending it again. Sending them your own uncertified copy, or a or computer image of a document (which you had edited with Photoshop, for all they know) should probably not work as a solution, because if it did, they wouldn't have the certified/authenticated copy requirement in the first place. Many customers would prefer they don't accept email 'proofs'. If you were being defrauded you might consider complaining that they made rookie mistakes such as changing the name on an account without taking proper precautions, so you can't have it both ways.

I have not used them since they were an early stage challenger bank owned by a private equity house several years ago, offering great rates and with a reputation for good service while building up the customer base. Since then, they went through a phase of stock-exchange-listed ownership and more recently taken over by First Rand. I don't know that the service you experienced relates to a new corporate culture or is a bit of a one-off. A few tens of negative reviews on trustpilot is nothing, they don't get the level of distrust on this forum that you see with some other institutions. A friend used them to set up a fixed deposit literally within the last few days and it went fine (or so it seems).

EdGasketTheSecond

Why go with a bank no-one's heard of? You might get less interest but play safe and stick to big names or NS&I. If you want risk buy shares.

Prism

EdGasketTheSecond wrote: »

Why go with a bank no-one's heard of? You might get less interest but play safe and stick to big names or NS&I. If you want risk buy shares.

Just because you haven't heard of them it doesn't mean they aren't safe to use. I have been using them for my business savings for a while now and have had no problems. The big names tend to pay low interest rates and are no safer to use.

bowlhead99

EdGasketTheSecond wrote: »

Why go with a bank no-one's heard of? You might get less interest but play safe and stick to big names or NS&I. If you want risk buy shares.

Who is suggesting to go with a bank no-ones's heard of, or taking risk with the deposit?

ColdIron

EdGasketTheSecond wrote: »

Why go with a bank no-one's heard of? You might get less interest but play safe and stick to big names or NS&I. If you want risk buy shares.

Hardly unheard of I've been using them since 2012. One of the best known challenger banks