Switching Bank Accounts

dealyboy

@RobinofLocksley said:

I’m a newbie to bank switching and have a few questions I am hoping someone with more experience might be able to help me with.

(1) Is it possible to switch a joint bank account and still get the switching bonus? Appreciate this may vary from bank to bank but wondered whether anyone had experience of it. 

(2) Once you switched and have received the bonus, the logical thing to me would seem to be to use that same account to switch to another bank to get another bonus. However, people who do this talk about having several current accounts which would suggest I’m missing something and moving the same account from one bank to another to get the bonus is not the way to do it. I’d be grateful for you views on this. 

(3) Finally, I’ve got an account I no longer use (it is effectively dormant) and I’ve now set up the requisite number of DDs to that account. Appreciate this is perhaps an elementary question, but I have emails from the organisations to which the DDs go, saying the DDs are in place - do I need to wait for a payment to be made under those DDs before I switch or is the fact I have emails saying they’re  in place sufficient. 

Any advice would be grateful received. 

Appreciate you have started a new thread, but you have had no answers, so ...

(1) Yes. Although I'm a single many if not all allow joint account switching (always check the new bank/building society switching T&Cs). However it may be better for each of you to open 'burner' or 'donor' accounts specifically for the purpose of switching, and thus each getting the incentives.
(2) A couple of things here. (i) Although it is certainly permitted to switch a new account immediately after receiving the incentive, several of us here think this is bad form and may in the future cause a negative outcome were there to be a review of accounts with the bank/banking group. (ii) Many banks/BS have associated accounts like regular savers which offer good interest rates and perks but need a current account.
(3) This is all handled by the Current Account Switching Service (CASS), intended to make things seamless. All established DDs will be switched whether used or not, you do not need to inform them and shouldn't try altering the details. The recipient organisations typically send you an e-mail or letter. One note: It is advised to not have a switch date closer than 4 days to a DD date.

Bigwheels1111

I wanted my friend to get a First Direct account like mine.
She did not have any credit history so this was a no go.
Due the her having no passport or driving licence this was causing issues with most banks.
I got her switched from Barclays to M&S Bank for £175 switching bonus.
Plus a credit card with very low limit. M&S were part of HSBC.
£20-£30 a month on the card and paid in full each month.
18 months later I referred her to FD.
A bit of a pain, they wanted exact income and proof etc to give her the first overdraft she has ever had.
Now she has a great bank account with £500 overdraft and credit card.

As above credit scores mean nothing, one of mine is 999.
O2 turned me down for a £5 a month contract.

dgcymraeg

Thinking of switching for the first time. I have a joint account and sole account with my current bank and also a savings account. Can I just switch my sole account and keep the joint account with my current bank? Or will the switching service close both for a “full” switch?

Zanderman

dgcymraeg said:

Thinking of switching for the first time. I have a joint account and sole account with my current bank and also a savings account. Can I just switch my sole account and keep the joint account with my current bank? Or will the switching service close both for a “full” switch?

The switching service only switches one account. If you have more than one the others stay where they are.

(despite the phrase 'switching banks' the process involved merely switches 'an account', so you're not switching bank if you have more than one account) 

Stargunner

dgcymraeg said:

Thinking of switching for the first time. I have a joint account and sole account with my current bank and also a savings account. Can I just switch my sole account and keep the joint account with my current bank? Or will the switching service close both for a “full” switch?

You can just switch your sole account. It is recommended on here to not switch your main bank account, but to open another account with either your current bank or another bank snd then switch that. 

Ivanissue

I've been switching bank accounts for ages with no trouble BUT last week my wife decided to go for the Barclays Switch.   WHAT A MISTAKE!
At 21.30 on 29th Nov 23, the last day for switching to get £175, I initiated the routine.  Opened an account - easy, Signed up for Barclays Blue Rewards - easy, entered all details for switching hit the button and ......ERROR, try again later.
I tried for the next couple of hours.  No luck.   The next morning i took a look on the site and as Barclays were still offering the £175 I tried again and the switch went through.   Great.   All this was done on a slow mobile phone using the barclays App as required.    Checked with the App and account was open but no news for me about the switch.  then 4 days later I tried to open the App and was told they had reset the PASSCODE for the App as we had not used it!!!!
Next my wife got a text telling her that they closed her Blue Rewards account - no reason given.
We still got nothing in the post so called Barclays - not easy as they don't want to TALK to people.   Found someone who said he could help when we had received the Debit Card.
Got he Debit Card today - HOORAY!.   Called them and related the story then the line went dead.     Time to switch again if we can ever get access to our funds!!!     DO NOT TRY TO SWITCH TO BARCLAYS.

zipdip

Well I know Martyn keeps on about switching bank accounts but the First Direct account is not straight forward as I have found out,my problem and I suspect it will stop many others from changing is that my Samsung smart phone is android 8.0 and theFirst Direct bank only want phones 9.0 and above and from what I have read that may well change to 11 or 12 very soon,it seems I cannot run the account from my Lap top until I put the app on my phone,a phone that has Santander accounts on it and a Nationwide account with no problem at all,now given Martyn is the guru of saving money what would he do,buy a new £800 phone so I can get the app to get £175  for switching.

Rudyson

zipdip said:

Well I know Martyn keeps on about switching bank accounts but the First Direct account is not straight forward as I have found out,my problem and I suspect it will stop many others from changing is that my Samsung smart phone is android 8.0 and theFirst Direct bank only want phones 9.0 and above and from what I have read that may well change to 11 or 12 very soon,it seems I cannot run the account from my Lap top until I put the app on my phone,a phone that has Santander accounts on it and a Nationwide account with no problem at all,now given Martyn is the guru of saving money what would he do,buy a new £800 phone so I can get the app to get £175  for switching.

If you're happy with online banking, you don't need the FD app and can still get the switch bonus, he said assuming the conditions haven't changed since my switch to them.