The decline of First Direct?

born_again

Sadly the above is indicative of a CEO & management team that are totally out of their depth. A lot of the old top management team have fled to pastures new.
Staff from internal departments are now having to handle call center calls with minimal training, even if they have never worked previously in there.
Hence the above DD issue.
So internal staff taking main calls, means longer waits for the internal departments...

MisterMotivated

sausage_time wrote: »

Refusing to stop sending paper statements unless my wife set up and regularly use internet banking (she has no interest in this).

I'm not a big fan of FD, but how does your wife expect to be able to receive her statements if FD stop sending paper ones and she doesn't have internet banking? Saying she has to "regularly use internet banking" could simply involve logging on now and then to check statements and nothing more.

sausage_time

MisterMotivated wrote: »

I'm not a big fan of FD, but how does your wife expect to be able to receive her statements if FD stop sending paper ones and she doesn't have internet banking? Saying she has to "regularly use internet banking" could simply involve logging on now and then to check statements and nothing more.

Like I say, she had no interest. She trusts me run our affairs, and knows I check everything to the last penny. The account was purely for bills and so on, and so was extremely dull. She has her own cards and accounts for personal items (which she looks after). Forcing her to log in does not force her to download and check statements, so the whole thing was a bit daft really. Not a deal breaker in itself, just part of the irritation.

blue.peter

Jlawson118 wrote: »

Is anybody else noticing this decline in what was once voted the best bank for customer service?

I banked with First Direct for 25 years - 1990 to 2015. They used to be great, but I began to notice them falling back about ten years ago. I never experienced as much of a decline in sevice as others have mentioned, but what really caught my attention was that their products weren't getting updated. They've simply stopped competing with other banks.

Sure, they've got one or two good products. I benefitted from their Offset Mortgage in particular. But once I paid that off there was nothing left to appeal to me. I stopped keeping any savings at all with them once the mortgage was paid: I found that I could get a better rate of return elsewhere many years ago.

But I can't say that other banks are better. When I left FD, I took my current account to Santander. Their phone service is pretty awful (though their online banking is good, and the 1-2-3 account is fairly good).

I've since moved on to RBS. Their service is poor. I've had a string of minor niggles with them, though none has been significant enough to justify a complaint. I'll probably stay until I get the second part of the joining incentive next summer, and move on again.

I also have experience of Barclays, Lloyds and Halifax, either on my own account or as my Mother's attorney. None of them is exactly inspiring.

My conclusion is that although FD isn't as good as it once was, none of the other banks are very good either. They're all cutting costs to the bone, and this has visible knock-on effects. I don't think that there is any bank currently offering good service and good products. The best you can find is mediocre products and service.

Where will I go when I leave RBS? I don't know. I'm certainly not interested in app-based banking: I prefer to use my big computer rather than my phone. It's possible that I might even go back to FD.

Milarky

First Direct closed my account opened in 2006 (in about 2012) I never used them for the headline 'customer service', merely the freebies. I used their bought-in account aggregator which was no better than the Egg Bank version. They were obviously an HSBC-stable product and I saw little innovation/change from this particular brand. Their website design is telling - 'telephone bank' or otherwise.


I've ended up with Tesco Bank as a good online (touch wood - stable) experience - as good as Nationwide's. You can phone them up too because - like FD they have no branches either. And the irony is they have HSBC as their back-end processor don't they?


[Tesco Bank 3.5 Stars]

Fingerbobs

I've very rarely had to phone First Direct over the years I've had accounts with them, but I was aware of their record of excellent customer service, answering the phone straight away by a person etc.


It really surprised me when I phoned them a couple of years ago to close an account, and got put in a holding queue! I thought that never happened with First Direct.

MisterMotivated

sausage_time wrote: »

Like I say, she had no interest. She trusts me run our affairs, and knows I check everything to the last penny. The account was purely for bills and so on, and so was extremely dull. She has her own cards and accounts for personal items (which she looks after). Forcing her to log in does not force her to download and check statements, so the whole thing was a bit daft really. Not a deal breaker in itself, just part of the irritation.

The bank can't force your wife to take any interest in her/your finances (I assume it's a joint account), but I'd expect there to be some regulation compelling the banks to ensure all account holders have some way of accessing their statements. Otherwise they leave themselves open to having at least some liability in various situations, such as in cases of financial abuse, for example. How does the bank know you haven't pressured your wife into refusing statements in any form, so she can't see you gambling away her recent six-figure inheritance? The statements are sent for the account holders' own good; what the account holder does or doesn't do with the statements is up to them. If your wife wants to chuck them straight into the recycling, or delete them from online banking, so be it, but at least she has the option to read them if she so chooses