DORMANT ACCOUNT 1990 BARCLAYS SAYS A/C # NOT FOUND BUT I HAVE PROOF

talkmagic007

I'll make a long story short.
Mum passed in June 2021, going through the paperwork I came across a bank statement from The WOOLWICH. when my late father retired he paid his retirement  cheque into
Its a fairly large sum over 10K in 1990

I know Barclays bought out The Woolwich, I wrote to mylostaccount.org.uk, who replied "Account not found"

I wrote to Barclays, no reply, wrote again, no reply

So i inquired further by going into the local Barclays, where I sat with the manager Andrew.
He used his in branch mailing system to inquire about this dormant account, and said Barclays 'should' reply in 12 weeks
In less than 2 weeks Barclays sent a letter saying "Account not found" It would have helped if they looked for my fathers name instead they searched for my late mother name.
rang barclays today, finally got through after going through sooo many 'options' on the keypad.
The operative was brilliant, said write into the COMPLAINTS TEAM giving all the documents, blah blah.
My question here is:-
I have the original woolwich bank statement showing the amount paid in along with interest (it was a 'prime account') and nothing has been withdrawn.
All im getting from Barclays is "Account not found"
IF i get this again from Barclays......what would be my next course of action?

Thank you

grandadgolfer

Could your mother have withdrawn and closed the account and when was the statement you found from

[Deleted User]

Probably nothing. It's likely that the account was transferred to a new account in the move to Barclays and the old details no longer exist. 

Did your parents have other accounts with Barclays in the last 30 years? It may be one of those in disguise, but of course that account could also have been closed down in the interim.

You could try a SAR in your father's name in the hope it turns up something not accessible to the front line staff.

msallen

talkmagic007 said:

... nothing has been withdrawn.

How do you know?

eskbanker

talkmagic007 said:

DORMANT ACCOUNT 1990 BARCLAYS SAYS A/C # NOT FOUND BUT I HAVE PROOF

You have proof that an account existed in 1990, but what else do you have that would support an assertion that it still does?

Deleted_User said:

You could try a SAR in your father's name in the hope it turns up something not accessible to the front line staff.

https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-data-protection/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/what-is-personal-data/what-is-personal-data/#pd6

Is information about deceased individuals personal data?

The UK GDPR only applies to information which relates to an identifiable living individual. Information relating to a deceased person does not constitute personal data and therefore is not subject to the UK GDPR.

xylophone

Who dealt with the estate when your father died? Was probate sought and granted?



Are you sure that  the account wasn't closed in the process of winding up the estate?

You say that you have a statement - presumably it shows account number and name - has a copy been supplied to Barclays?

mab3000

Might be possible that the account was closed before The Woolwich was taken over by Barclays therefore nothing was transferred over to them. 

Emmia

Was the account in your father's sole name? If it was, then it was almost certainly closed when he died as part of the winding up process, and the proceeds paid into either an account held by your mum, or into an executors account... I'd be surprised if an account with £10k in was overlooked...

Thrugelmir

Woolwich ceased to exist in 2007. Account holders were then given a new account number and sort code under the Barclays umbrella. 

Miles86

This is a classic problem. By historic practice and modern data protection requirements, 6 years after the closure of the account the bank will cease to hold a record of it. They therefore cannot say what happened to an account, simply that they have no record of it, and therefore by process of elimination it must have been closed in the past 

Zanderman

Miles86 said:

This is a classic problem. By historic practice and modern data protection requirements, 6 years after the closure of the account the bank will cease to hold a record of it. They therefore cannot say what happened to an account, simply that they have no record of it, and therefore by process of elimination it must have been closed in the past 

If that were the case for the OP (which it might be) it's not actually a problem - as the situation would prove the account was closed and therefore the OP's premise, that the account must still exist, would be shown to be incorrect.  Problem solved, not problem created.  It is very likely indeed that the account was closed.

The issue here is that the OP seems to believe, for reasons unclear, that the account wasn't closed.  Though the OP has, apparently, no evidence for that, merely evidence that the account did originally exist.  Which is not evidence that still does.

The situation is complicated by the account being with the Woolwich, so the account would, in effect, have been closed (in the sense that the account number eased to exist) when Woolwich customers got new account numbers under Barclays.  So the OP may be looking for the wrong account anyway.

And also massively complicated by the account being the OP's late father's, so would have been part of his estate, and so would, by definition, have been transferred to another name and, almost certainly, another account (quite possibly in an entirely different bank) as part of the probate process.  So the OP may not even be looking at the right bank.

Accounts of deceased people are generally closed - as the account holder is dead - and assets moved to other accounts in the name of beneficiaries, not left in the same place (even with a change of name). It's not clear why the OP is searching for assets in his father's name - unless he thinks this was overlooked at probate.

The OP needs to provide more info on the situation and/or update the thread if we're ever going to understand what's gone on.

Edited to add:  There should, after OP's father's death, have been a statement of accounts compiled by the Executor of the father's estate. That would be the first place to look for this money.