Santander twice locked current account after attempting 25k payment to Wise

jcuurthht

I recently received 240k inheritance from NS&I in to my Santander current account. I attempted to make a payment to my Wise account of 25k and was locked out of my account. I called them, went through security and was told I would receive a call back from the fraud team back office within 48hrs. No call came, but I did have access to my account again.

Tried a 1k payment to Wise: this worked

Tried 24k payment: locked again

Called and went through the same process and was told to expect a call in 48 hrs. 48hrs came and went, no call yet.

Is this common with Santander or large payments in general? I'm happy they have some security for larger payments to prevent fraud, but being locked out of my current account for nearly a week while waiting for them to call me back is unacceptable.

Once this is resolved and I can make the payments, what is the best way of moving the money to Wise? I was planning on moving 100k per day in 25k chunks via BACS. I could also use CHAPS, but I am concerned about the money going missing/being flagged as laundering etc.

southone

It sounds like you're going over your limit I always make my first one pound transfer to set up the route followed by 1000 pounds then to make larger payments I do it on the telephone with an agent bit of a pain and you have to go through security at least you don't get locked out of your account just ask them to make a payment to the whatever payment reference number that is that you've set up

Daliah

Use telephone banking for large amounts. They will do up to £100k for free, and if you need more than £100k, you can do a CHAPS payment which costs £25.

Molehusband

jcuurthht said:

I recently received 240k inheritance from NS&I in to my Santander current account. I attempted to make a payment to my Wise account of 25k and was locked out of my account. I called them, went through security and was told I would receive a call back from the fraud team back office within 48hrs. No call came, but I did have access to my account again.

Tried a 1k payment to Wise: this worked

Tried 24k payment: locked again

My experience with Santander is that in practice the maximum single Faster Payments withdrawal seems to be £24,999 (although their documentation suggests £25,000). So your additional £1 probably caused the difficulty.

jcuurthht

Daliah said:

Use telephone banking for large amounts. They will do up to £100k for free, and if you need more than £100k, you can do a CHAPS payment which costs £25.

Is telephone banking something that I will already have with Santander? e.g. I just call them, answer some security questions, and request the transfers.

southone

jcuurthht said:

Daliah said:

Use telephone banking for large amounts. They will do up to £100k for free, and if you need more than £100k, you can do a CHAPS payment which costs £25.

Is telephone banking something that I will already have with Santander? e.g. I just call them, answer some security questions, and request the transfers.

Yes just call the number on their on your documentation or on their website the call centre number

jcuurthht

I don't mind them locking the account. But waiting over 48 hours for a call back from the fraud team is unacceptable.

Speedbird676

jcuurthht said:

I don't mind them locking the account. But waiting over 48 hours for a call back from the fraud team is unacceptable.

When this has happened to me with Santander I've never had to wait for a call back.

I call the number on my card, go through security, explain to the agent what the issue is, they then transfer me to the fraud team who ask some additional security questions, approve the transfer and unlock my account.

That payee is usually then trusted for future payments from internet banking.

Daliah

a while ago, Santander gave me 0800 151 3151 as the direct number for their Security team 

Speedbird676

Molehusband said:

jcuurthht said:

I recently received 240k inheritance from NS&I in to my Santander current account. I attempted to make a payment to my Wise account of 25k and was locked out of my account. I called them, went through security and was told I would receive a call back from the fraud team back office within 48hrs. No call came, but I did have access to my account again.

Tried a 1k payment to Wise: this worked

Tried 24k payment: locked again

My experience with Santander is that in practice the maximum single Faster Payments withdrawal seems to be £24,999 (although their documentation suggests £25,000). So your additional £1 probably caused the difficulty.

The limit is indeed £24,999 rather than £25,000, although this is per transaction rather than per day.

I have sent 2x£24,000 in a single day to the same payee with no issues.

Daliah

jcuurthht said:

I don't mind them locking the account. But waiting over 48 hours for a call back from the fraud team is unacceptable.

Raise a formal complaint if they don't call back as promised