Recommendations Please - Community Group Bank Account

steelcity4

Hi

Earlier in the year I took over as Chair of a local "Friends of" group for our local park. We have an existing account with HSBC but to say they are a nightmare to deal with is an understatement. I have been trying to get in touch with them to change some signatories and change the address the statements go to for several months to no avail. So now, I am thinking of transferring the majority of the money to another bank. One that we can actually contact and deal with! We would close the account but that would require being able to actually speak to someone at HSBC!

So, I've been looking around. A lot of Clubs and Societies accounts are currently not taking applications. I saw a blog post saying that Starling Bank were excellent for this. I spoke to someone at Starling however, having looked at their eligibility on their website, it says you have to be a registered Charity or a Limited Company. We are neither. Just, I guess, a Community Interest group with Constitution etc. So, I guess my questions are the following

* If we were to move most of our money to Starling, which account should we go for? Under their eligilibility listed on their website, they don't accept sole traders - which I know they do. So has anyone who has done this tell me what to go for it would be greatly appreciated. We would go for the Joint Directors one so that any transaction could be seen by all so there was complete transparency. There set up looks straight-forward and just the kind of thing we need.

* Are there any other Club & Society Bank accounts (that are currently accepting new customers) who are easy to access with zero fees? We are pretty low activity and have less than £1000 in the bank. No standing orders etc so it's low maintenance stuff we are looking for.

Many thanks for any advice :-)

henm2

To change the mandate for the hsbc account go on their website  www.hsbc.co.uk, click the business tab top left, and scroll down to 'online forms', Select the right mandate form, complete and send in to the bank. New signatories may have to go into a branch with ID, proof of address.
The bank may also ask for a copy of the minutes of the meeting which decided the changes. 

Once the new signatories are on HSBC's system then do a separate letter signed in accordance with that mandate to change the correspondence address. 

steelcity4

Hi henm2

Yes, we did all that only to receive a letter a number of weeks later saying there was some sort of problem with the form (we don't know what as we checked and double-checked it) and to ring them to sort. I also emailed them  .. they said to ring them to sort. After three hours of waiting on hold, I've run out of patience. 

jonesMUFCforever

You might be having problems with HSBC but at least you have an account. Trying to open a community account at this time will be difficult because of covid and banks are under staff pressures to open loans and accounts for businesses which take priority at this time.
You may want to have a look at Lloyds Treasurers account (which is opened online anyway - not in branch) - other banks may offer similar accounts.

henm2

steelcity4 said:

Hi henm2

Yes, we did all that only to receive a letter a number of weeks later saying there was some sort of problem with the form. 

Did the letter not say what the issue was? If not go into a HSBC branch and I am sure they can give you further information. 

steelcity4

No, it didn't. That would be much more helpful if it did.