HSBC current account customer? You can now get 3% ‘easy-access’ on your savings

ranciduk

I’ve never had one personal notice from them 

they email me every month to say my statements are ready 

never about any rate increase!

kaMelo

ranciduk said:

I’ve never had one personal notice from them 

they email me every month to say my statements are ready 

never about any rate increase!

Which bank(s) and what type of accounts?

ForumUser7

Bridlington1 said:

gt94sss2 said:

ranciduk said:

The big high street Banks don’t contact their customers as a rule to inform of rate increases, do they?

They do inform you of increases but there is no requirement to tell you in advance (unlike if they are cutting rates)

From my experience some do, some don't. LBG, HSBC, TSB and Natwest group have never told me of a savings rate increase. Virgin, Santander and Nationwide have.

I've never had a savings account with Co-op so can't comment on them.

I’ve had texts from NatWest and RBS a while after an increase, telling me the RS rate has increased. Never seem to get ‘the rate is going to increase’ texts though.

Bridlington1

ForumUser7 said:

Bridlington1 said:

gt94sss2 said:

ranciduk said:

The big high street Banks don’t contact their customers as a rule to inform of rate increases, do they?

They do inform you of increases but there is no requirement to tell you in advance (unlike if they are cutting rates)

From my experience some do, some don't. LBG, HSBC, TSB and Natwest group have never told me of a savings rate increase. Virgin, Santander and Nationwide have.

I've never had a savings account with Co-op so can't comment on them.

I’ve had texts from NatWest and RBS a while after an increase, telling me the RS rate has increased. Never seem to get ‘the rate is going to increase’ texts though.

I've never had that text from Natwest/RBS. I wonder if marketing preferences are at play here, I always set them to post/email only so maybe they classed saving rate increases as "marketing" for some reason.

TheBanker

Regardless of the T&Cs, it surprises me that some banks aren't more proactive in notifying customers of rate increases - given the reason they are increasing the rate is presumably to encourage people to keep their savings with that bank.

My experience is that Santander send texts/emails, Natwest send texts (but after the increase has happened), Shawbrook send texts and Chase send push notifications and emails.

Your marketing preferences shouldn't make a difference because notification of a rate change should be classed as a servicing message (it's important information that you need to know about how your account operates) rather than marketing.

Bridlington1

TheBanker said:

Regardless of the T&Cs, it surprises me that some banks aren't more proactive in notifying customers of rate increases - given the reason they are increasing the rate is presumably to encourage people to keep their savings with that bank.

My experience is that Santander send texts/emails, Natwest send texts (but after the increase has happened), Shawbrook send texts and Chase send push notifications and emails.

Your marketing preferences shouldn't make a difference because notification of a rate change should be classed as a servicing message (it's important information that you need to know about how your account operates) rather than marketing.

In some ways though it doesn't surprise me that some banks aren't as proactive in notifying their customers of rate increases. Say someone opened an EA savings account last year, which was competitive at the time but hasn't seen a rate increase since. If the customer had chosen that account because it was competitive but had failed to review their savings options, maybe they had moved their funds over then not thought much about their savings rates since, and then suddenly got an email saying that the rate has risen to say 3%, it might prompt them to go looking at EA accounts elsewhere, notice that some providers now offer 4% and move their funds out.

In this instance by increasing their rate but not sending messages to existing customers they are able to attract a few more new customers who only consider saving with a small selection of banks, whilst reducing the risk of existing customers reviewing their options and moving the funds out.