A Bankers View, Open Letter To Martin Lewis And His Followers On Bank Charges.

Realist

Interesting first post and replies but have you noticed that everyone has an opinion and Bankgirl has not responded.

Which makes me think she's laughing at every reply here.

Wait and see if the OP has a response and then reply with sensible questions/replies.

Owe, nice response Martin

Regards.

whitewing

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

I'm not "BANKER GIRL" but the answer is simple.

With that level of incompetence, and the evidence you have amassed, why on earth didn't you go to the Financial Ombudsman?

Probably because they are wishy-washy too.

AMBeukes

You are wrong. Exceeding your limit is stupid and people need to budget, but, Nanny, I do not need you or any other bank to punish me by charging me a fine. Return the debit order, stop order or direct debit; that's all and let the party that is not receiving the money charge the costs incurred. A couple of things you must realise, you have my cheque for 4 to 8 days when it is supposed to clear, and allows you to use that money for your purposes. In this day and age, where is the delay? When the account is in credit part of the month, you do not pay interest, but you will charge interest when an account is in debit part of the month.

Most customers are against the charge and in 7 months at the bank you need to increase your people skills and know why and how people get into debt. I, too, have bank experience and have experience with people getting into debt for various reasons, but I can assure you that the banks I have dealt with, will never employ a person such as yourself.

I must admit that the banking system in the UK is fairly antiquated when compared to banking internationally. Employing people with a Scrooge like attitude as yourself is exactly the keep them in their place attitude banking in this country still has. You forget who pays you and you should take note what the average depositor has done to the Northern Rock before dealing with customers and not wrongdoers, in such a manner.

Tim_L

WestonDave wrote: »

Tim - simple answer - leave enough in there to cover what might be coming up. A £100 buffer left in your account would only earn £5 a year if held on deposit elsewhere.

Well actually no. I make about 80% net profit annually on the cash in my accounts by gambling with it, but to do that it gets moved around a hell of a lot, and I have to deposit cash at a bookmaker to hit an opportunity usually inside a window of about 60 seconds. I often don't have the chance to check balances so have to rely on memory. My monthly turnover through a current account (of which I have 6) is generally of the order of £25-50K, and I place about £3M worth of bets a year. I also have a day job and conventional finances, which are managed as carefully as time allows.

So very many thanks for trying to simplify this for me, but I'm guessing you don't quite work on the same level of complexity. Charges for me are an occupational hazard, and I easily make enough not to have to worry about them - I've had 3 in the last 12 months, of which one has been repaid. I'm pretty confident about getting the other two repaid.

My objection is that having seen the tricks the banks play, I have SYMPATHY for people in a tight financial situation, and I'm not so grasping and miserly as to expect other people to subsidise my own banking.

We're coming up to Christmas. More and more reading what is posted in support of these charges reminds me of Scrooge saying "are there no workhouses?" and washing his hands of any consideration for the less fortunate. We forge, in life, our own chains, and there are some absolute doozers being made here.

Tim_L

Tootsie_Roll wrote: »

Another urban myth I'm afraid - the banks still have to hold money in reserve to give back to you when you want to withdraw it. Now some of your credit balance might be used to invest and indeed may earn them some interest, however when you balance that out against them processing transactions for you throughout the month for 'free' it still works out that they lose overall.

Banks have been cross selling products for as long as I have had an account - 25+ years.

So, Tootsie, banks make nothing from operating personal current accounts? Or worse, they are "loss leaders" and actually bear a cost for the banks?

Before we all disappear in floods of tears for the poor misunderstood banking industry, desparately trying to use a bit of tough love to educate the great unwashed into running their financial affairs properly, can we just ask a few questions?

If these accounts are such a drain on resources, why in the name of God do they continue to want to operate them? Why is there such intense competition for UK personal current accounts? Why do banks pay actual hard cash to recruit customers? And how is it that banks, giving all of this money away as they are forced to, still remain immensely profitable?

And the answer is that they take a much more rounded view. Personal account customers are selling opportunities. Banks can look at personal spending, where it is done and how much it is, to target loan application shots and other selling messages. This is extremely valuable, or at least was until sites like this came along suggesting that people shop around for products. Actually what the banks REALLY want is a clientele of the financially illiterate, and it irritates the living bejesus out of them that ideas such as stoozing and rate surfing are becoming mainstream.

Actually there is money to be made holding current account deposits. Banks don't need to be fully liquid, they have to meet liquidity rules which don't preclude some sort of use of the cash for other purposes. But the real value in personal banking is from the access to customers.

Banks remain profitable. No-one is obliging them to offer current accounts at a loss, the same as no-one obliges Tescos to sell bread cheaper than cost. They do it to retain a competitive advantage, and for every big bank looking to introduce charges there is another smaller one looking to build market share. So if it's such a big problem to offer current accounts at a loss, they have only to stop doing it.

Until they do, they can just stop moaning and get on with it.

Tootsie_Roll

Tim_L wrote: »

Until they do, they can just stop moaning and get on with it.

They're not moaning - you are !

Tim_L

Well I guess that told me.

Any chance of engaging on the substantive points, or are you just interested in making a few barbed comments?

furrybloke

The majority pay minimal interest & cover the cost of current accounts this way. As has already been said they use the spending habits for market research & it saves them having to buy this info. That is the reason they offer free banking. The charges are outrageous. I got charged over £1200 in 3 months on my current account & credit cards when I got into difficulty despite informing them before anything was due, out of 11 accounts/cards, only one worked with me the rest just charged.
Regarding current accounts, why do they not just bounce & give notice before taking charges? They could provide written, email & online banking notification of charges 14 days before they were due which would give people the chance to avoid further charges. Sorry I forget they would then only get £30 per item rather than £30 for clearing & £15 per day or whatever your bank charge & then £0 for being over limit!!!
HSBC give notice before charges does anyone else?

nmcnelis

I'm sad to say that when reading banker girls post i am reminded of myself a couple of years ago. I also have a fair bit of sympathy for her.

At the time i was in my first year of working for rbs and was unquestioning of the training i was given by the bank and eager to progress up the corporate ladder. I didn't understand how anyone could get charges month after month - surely after the first one they would learn their lesson? I felt pleased with myself when i consolidated someones debt so as to reduce their monthly outgoings, extending the repayment term in the process. Heck, sometimes i could even put a little bit of extra cash in their pockets so they could treat themselves at the same time. I was keen to encourage ppi be taken alongside a loan after one particular course where we were asked "how would you feel if something where to happen and you hadn't sold ppi?". They never mentioned that the same insurance could be bought elsewhere for a tenth of the cost.

After about a year in the bank my eyes began to open and i became less and less comfortable with what i was being asked to do. Fortunately i found another job with citizens advice as a financial education worker. I have to say that i now sleep much easier at night knowing that i am genuinely helping people without asking for anything in return. I hope that banker girl will be similarly enlightened soon.

MABLE

The charges are possibly out of line with what it costs to return an unpaid item. However what really gets me is we are all having to suffer because the minority are unable to budget properly. A few months ago a poster said she had claimed over £2.5 in unfair charges back. She then went on to say after getting this money she still continued to go outside the banks terms and conditions and had the cheek to moan they are returned a DD for insufficient funds, thus incurring a fee.

Alot of these charges could have been avoided with a bit of planning. Also speak to the bank before you run into difficulities. The majority of bank staff are very helpful. However if you approach the bank with a less than courteous manner that will certainly not help the situation.

I have been with LLoyds for over 25 years and in all that time I have had very little problems. However when I was financially stretched years ago and went into the manager and she did everything to help. I think it is all about working together and not apart.