Starling and Barclays for high value transfer

bd10

Hi all,

What has your experience be using Starling bank and Barclays for a high value transfer?

Here's the case: Later this year I'll be expecting funds of around EUR 80-100k due to an inheritance abroad. Local taxes will have been paid by the executor of the estate. This EUR amount I plan to receive in my Starling EUR account, then to convert it into GBP and send most of it to my primary GBP account with Barclays. This account is linked to my ISAs and SIPPs into which I then want to deposit the funds. I fear that the chain of transactions will not go as smoothly as I hope. Just to add: I am the sole account holder of both Starling and Barclays accounts.

I had a small life policy already paid into my Starling EUR account with no issues. But the payment was made by an insurance company and not a private individual as in this case here. Member of my family is the executor of the will and will distribute payments to all beneficiaries of the will. Would this raise alarm bells at the incoming bank, i.e. Starling? According to Starling's FAQ, I should contact their customer service team before I want to make the onward payment. Ok, I shall do so.

For the transfer between Starling and Barclays, I had made previous transfers already, much smaller amounts though and with no issue. Spoke with the customer rep at Barclays and they said it should be fine. But when searching online, I stumble across all sorts of stories of Barclays freezing account due to suspicious activities. Nothing suspicious here imho, all I want to do is to receive say £80k and deposit it into ISAs and SIPPs linked to that account, no cash withdrawal or anything.

I dread the thought of the funds being frozen and accounts blocked. What would be the best course of action to avoid any potential hassle? Has anyone experience with either bank in similar situations?

Thanks!

eskbanker

Other than notifying both banks that the money will be coming, I'm not sure there's much else you can do - the security measures in use will be automated and neither bank will be able to give any guarantee that there won't be questions asked, so it remains a possibility that one or both could hold the transaction or even suspend the account, but as long as you have an audit trail of documentation relating to the money it shouldn't cause any lasting issue.  I had an inheritance-related payment held and account blocked with another bank recently, but half an hour later all was good again after a conversation with the fraud team involved (without any need to go to branch or submit evidence, etc), so it's not necessarily something to be dreaded.

Actually, one other thing you can do is to ensure that you have access to funds in another account, as a preemptive precautionary protection in case of either account being blocked....

AnotherJoe

In the past month I've transferred IN to my Barclays about £350k and transferred the same out again.

IN was in from reputable sources like Santander and Hargreaves Lansdown, OUT was to solicitors.

No problems at all with IN.

Barclays  max OUT per day is 100k on web but as 2x£50k. (Phone app is £30k max IIRC) You can also phone them and they will transfer another £50k to your £100k.

Glitches. The £50k transferred by them got held up in fraud for nearly a day. And then cleared without any action on my part.

One one day, the second of two £50ks was cancelled by them for looking like an accidental duplicate.

The occasional transfer (sometimes a £1k one sometimes a £50k) got held up until i was sent a text asking if i really wanted to do that. This usually took about 30 minutes. I also, occasionally, got asked a set of q's seemingly aimed at seeing if i was a doddery old buffoon sending my money to Nigeria. Possibly yes to the former,  but no to the latter.

All these apart from the first transaction were to a stored payee.

So no real big issues, no accounts locked etc. Fingers crossed for you.

bd10

Thanks guys, this sounds promisising! As eskbanker suggested, I'll set a few quid aside in my Nationwide account which will not be part of this transaction just as a back-up. Thanks again.