The Top Regular Savers Discussion Thread

francoghezzi

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

DARLINGTON

Five days without the possibility to access our money after the internal mistake on the amount of interests. Still no change this morning. It's starting to sound quite like a farce

The block was applied on the 2nd, today is the 5th.  Two of the days between were non-working days, although some staff might have been in on the Saturday.

As the problem seems to be with mid-term interest additions rather than maturity I imagine the number of customers who planned to withdraw money or close their accounts over the weekend must be relatively small.

As a small building society it doesn't seem unreasonable they might need a couple of working days at least to get a full idea of the scope of the problem and design a fix which doesn't create additional problems further down the line.  Rather than "farce" I think it was prudent of them to block people taking the money and running, and also take a reasonable time to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse.

I also imagine if anyone was in desperate need of the money in one of the affected accounts then a phone call to Darlington might enable a withdrawal of the money required, minus the overpaid interest.  And if the error has caused you financial distress then I suspect Darlington would give appropriate consideration to a complaint and a request for reimbursement of your costs.

A bit of patience might be needed, but at 9:14am on the second working day of the year it shouldn't be totally unexpected that Darlington are still working on a resolution.

You are right. Enjoy. Am happy to be the only one who will take the money and leave at the earliest possibility. I don't like thinking that my savings are in some sort of 'Disneyland' like building societies. They have more than a quid not balanced in their books, I don't want even think that they closed on Saturday and on Sunday and enjoyed time off with all the mess that is going on. If they did it, well, that is another reason to stay away for me

Bridlington1

francoghezzi said:

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

DARLINGTON

Five days without the possibility to access our money after the internal mistake on the amount of interests. Still no change this morning. It's starting to sound quite like a farce

The block was applied on the 2nd, today is the 5th.  Two of the days between were non-working days, although some staff might have been in on the Saturday.

As the problem seems to be with mid-term interest additions rather than maturity I imagine the number of customers who planned to withdraw money or close their accounts over the weekend must be relatively small.

As a small building society it doesn't seem unreasonable they might need a couple of working days at least to get a full idea of the scope of the problem and design a fix which doesn't create additional problems further down the line.  Rather than "farce" I think it was prudent of them to block people taking the money and running, and also take a reasonable time to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse.

I also imagine if anyone was in desperate need of the money in one of the affected accounts then a phone call to Darlington might enable a withdrawal of the money required, minus the overpaid interest.  And if the error has caused you financial distress then I suspect Darlington would give appropriate consideration to a complaint and a request for reimbursement of your costs.

A bit of patience might be needed, but at 9:14am on the second working day of the year it shouldn't be totally unexpected that Darlington are still working on a resolution.

You are right. Enjoy. Am happy to be the only one who will take the money and leave at the earliest possibility. I don't like thinking that my savings are in some sort of 'Disneyland' like building societies. They have more than a quid not balanced in their books, I don't want even think that they closed on Saturday and on Sunday and enjoyed time off with all the mess that is going on. If they did it, well, that is another reason to stay away for me

If I were to abandon every building society that I've experienced technical issues with I'd need to boycott the following off the top of my head:
Darlington BS, YBS, Manchester BS, Dudley BS, Melton BS,  Leeds BS, Beverley BS, Hanley Economic BS, Leek BS, Mansfield BS, Monmouthshire BS, Nationwide, Nottingham BS, Principality, Progressive BS, Saffron BS, Scottish BS, Suffolk BS, not to mention several banks whilst I'm at it. I'd struggle to find anyone left to bank with.

Pretty much every bank/building society has technical issues at some stage, many others make errors. There's a general view among many dealing with any sort of business that any issue can be resolved instantly just by the click of a button, it's more often than not a lot less straightforward than that.

I'm just going to sit back and do nothing on this one for the time being. I've paid into my 12 Month RS Issue 2 this month, I shan't need to withdraw from or close it, my other two Darlington RSs sit there with around £1 each in them, I know what's happening with the interest rates on the accounts following the BOE base rate change. If I'm left financially worse off by it then I'll make a complaint off the back of that but at the moment leaving them to get on with it seems the best course of action.

WillPS

francoghezzi said:

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

DARLINGTON

Five days without the possibility to access our money after the internal mistake on the amount of interests. Still no change this morning. It's starting to sound quite like a farce

The block was applied on the 2nd, today is the 5th.  Two of the days between were non-working days, although some staff might have been in on the Saturday.

As the problem seems to be with mid-term interest additions rather than maturity I imagine the number of customers who planned to withdraw money or close their accounts over the weekend must be relatively small.

As a small building society it doesn't seem unreasonable they might need a couple of working days at least to get a full idea of the scope of the problem and design a fix which doesn't create additional problems further down the line.  Rather than "farce" I think it was prudent of them to block people taking the money and running, and also take a reasonable time to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse.

I also imagine if anyone was in desperate need of the money in one of the affected accounts then a phone call to Darlington might enable a withdrawal of the money required, minus the overpaid interest.  And if the error has caused you financial distress then I suspect Darlington would give appropriate consideration to a complaint and a request for reimbursement of your costs.

A bit of patience might be needed, but at 9:14am on the second working day of the year it shouldn't be totally unexpected that Darlington are still working on a resolution.

You are right. Enjoy. Am happy to be the only one who will take the money and leave at the earliest possibility. I don't like thinking that my savings are in some sort of 'Disneyland' like building societies. They have more than a quid not balanced in their books, I don't want even think that they closed on Saturday and on Sunday and enjoyed time off with all the mess that is going on. If they did it, well, that is another reason to stay away for me

I think your expectations are unreasonable.

francoghezzi

WillPS said:

francoghezzi said:

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

DARLINGTON

Five days without the possibility to access our money after the internal mistake on the amount of interests. Still no change this morning. It's starting to sound quite like a farce

The block was applied on the 2nd, today is the 5th.  Two of the days between were non-working days, although some staff might have been in on the Saturday.

As the problem seems to be with mid-term interest additions rather than maturity I imagine the number of customers who planned to withdraw money or close their accounts over the weekend must be relatively small.

As a small building society it doesn't seem unreasonable they might need a couple of working days at least to get a full idea of the scope of the problem and design a fix which doesn't create additional problems further down the line.  Rather than "farce" I think it was prudent of them to block people taking the money and running, and also take a reasonable time to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse.

I also imagine if anyone was in desperate need of the money in one of the affected accounts then a phone call to Darlington might enable a withdrawal of the money required, minus the overpaid interest.  And if the error has caused you financial distress then I suspect Darlington would give appropriate consideration to a complaint and a request for reimbursement of your costs.

A bit of patience might be needed, but at 9:14am on the second working day of the year it shouldn't be totally unexpected that Darlington are still working on a resolution.

You are right. Enjoy. Am happy to be the only one who will take the money and leave at the earliest possibility. I don't like thinking that my savings are in some sort of 'Disneyland' like building societies. They have more than a quid not balanced in their books, I don't want even think that they closed on Saturday and on Sunday and enjoyed time off with all the mess that is going on. If they did it, well, that is another reason to stay away for me

I think your expectations are unreasonable.

I know, but am happy to 'come' from a century when every job was taken seriously and from an epoch when if the books didn't balance people were asked to stay a bit longer and put them right. Trust me, it was a better world :-)
Having said that if at Darlington BS are happy to have a Sunday roast while being out of pocket for a few millions is totally up to them. I wish them a fantastic 2026, without my money

francoghezzi

Bridlington1 said:

francoghezzi said:

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

DARLINGTON

Five days without the possibility to access our money after the internal mistake on the amount of interests. Still no change this morning. It's starting to sound quite like a farce

The block was applied on the 2nd, today is the 5th.  Two of the days between were non-working days, although some staff might have been in on the Saturday.

As the problem seems to be with mid-term interest additions rather than maturity I imagine the number of customers who planned to withdraw money or close their accounts over the weekend must be relatively small.

As a small building society it doesn't seem unreasonable they might need a couple of working days at least to get a full idea of the scope of the problem and design a fix which doesn't create additional problems further down the line.  Rather than "farce" I think it was prudent of them to block people taking the money and running, and also take a reasonable time to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse.

I also imagine if anyone was in desperate need of the money in one of the affected accounts then a phone call to Darlington might enable a withdrawal of the money required, minus the overpaid interest.  And if the error has caused you financial distress then I suspect Darlington would give appropriate consideration to a complaint and a request for reimbursement of your costs.

A bit of patience might be needed, but at 9:14am on the second working day of the year it shouldn't be totally unexpected that Darlington are still working on a resolution.

You are right. Enjoy. Am happy to be the only one who will take the money and leave at the earliest possibility. I don't like thinking that my savings are in some sort of 'Disneyland' like building societies. They have more than a quid not balanced in their books, I don't want even think that they closed on Saturday and on Sunday and enjoyed time off with all the mess that is going on. If they did it, well, that is another reason to stay away for me

If I were to abandon every building society that I've experienced technical issues with I'd need to boycott the following off the top of my head:
Darlington BS, YBS, Manchester BS, Dudley BS, Melton BS,  Leeds BS, Beverley BS, Hanley Economic BS, Leek BS, Mansfield BS, Monmouthshire BS, Nationwide, Nottingham BS, Principality, Progressive BS, Saffron BS, Scottish BS, Suffolk BS, not to mention several banks whilst I'm at it. I'd struggle to find anyone left to bank with.

Pretty much every bank/building society has technical issues at some stage, many others make errors. There's a general view among many dealing with any sort of business that any issue can be resolved instantly just by the click of a button, it's more often than not a lot less straightforward than that.

I'm just going to sit back and do nothing on this one for the time being. I've paid into my 12 Month RS Issue 2 this month, I shan't need to withdraw from or close it, my other two Darlington RSs sit there with around £1 each in them, I know what's happening with the interest rates on the accounts following the BOE base rate change. If I'm left financially worse off by it then I'll make a complaint off the back of that but at the moment leaving them to get on with it seems the best course of action.

This is not a technical issue, what happened will cause 'ground' to complain because that regular saver has been thought to allow withdrawals in any moments, plus it has nothing to do with the IT department. Funny that you mention Monmouthshire and few others that am happy not to have any connections with. Of any kind :-)

Ps. Thank you for your fantastic job on this thread

trickydicky14

flaneurs_lobster said:

dcs34 said:

trickydicky14 said:

allegro120 said:

trickydicky14 said:

West Brom B.S
My regular saver was showing with interest on the morning of the 31st so requested it all sent to my nominated bank account, now looks like I wont see my money until Monday the 5th.

My WestBrom morphed today (£3098.80).  I requested to close the account.  I think they are doing it manually so Monday is the earliest to receive funds, but we should still get 2.35% for the cash drag days.

The thing is, mine matured on the 31st and had gone from the website the next morning so I can't see it earning any interest until it arrives in my bank account.

West Brom Regular Saver Maturity

Same situation. Matured on the 31st. On the 1st I moved £5 from the Access Regular Saver to an easy access account (to keep a relationship) and requested the rest to my nominated account.

The new easy access account was approved and opened the next day (2nd) with the money transferred. Still yet to see the main payment to my nominated account, which I think should arrive by CoP on the 5th.

Seems several people are awaiting matured funds to arrive in nominated accounts today.

Has anyone had they money credited yet?

No sign of it yet.......

Section62

francoghezzi said:

WillPS said:

francoghezzi said:

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

DARLINGTON

Five days without the possibility to access our money after the internal mistake on the amount of interests. Still no change this morning. It's starting to sound quite like a farce

The block was applied on the 2nd, today is the 5th.  Two of the days between were non-working days, although some staff might have been in on the Saturday.

As the problem seems to be with mid-term interest additions rather than maturity I imagine the number of customers who planned to withdraw money or close their accounts over the weekend must be relatively small.

As a small building society it doesn't seem unreasonable they might need a couple of working days at least to get a full idea of the scope of the problem and design a fix which doesn't create additional problems further down the line.  Rather than "farce" I think it was prudent of them to block people taking the money and running, and also take a reasonable time to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse.

I also imagine if anyone was in desperate need of the money in one of the affected accounts then a phone call to Darlington might enable a withdrawal of the money required, minus the overpaid interest.  And if the error has caused you financial distress then I suspect Darlington would give appropriate consideration to a complaint and a request for reimbursement of your costs.

A bit of patience might be needed, but at 9:14am on the second working day of the year it shouldn't be totally unexpected that Darlington are still working on a resolution.

You are right. Enjoy. Am happy to be the only one who will take the money and leave at the earliest possibility. I don't like thinking that my savings are in some sort of 'Disneyland' like building societies. They have more than a quid not balanced in their books, I don't want even think that they closed on Saturday and on Sunday and enjoyed time off with all the mess that is going on. If they did it, well, that is another reason to stay away for me

I think your expectations are unreasonable.

I know, but am happy to 'come' from a century when every job was taken seriously and from an epoch when if the books didn't balance people were asked to stay a bit longer and put them right. Trust me, it was a better world :-)

Tired and exhausted people don't perform well and make mistakes.  If that happened (and it generally wasn't my working experience) then it wasn't necessarily a 'better world'.  Dragging people in from their holiday to 'fix' a problem - which in the scheme of things is a triviality - would be poor management... and in my view if there were a reason to avoid a financial institution then one that panics and risks making the situation worse would the the one to avoid, rather than one which takes rapid action to stop bad becoming worse and then figures out a full fix when the right people are available. 

The so-called 'Disneyland' like building societies often offer good value savings accounts, typically more generous than the larger ones.  If we were talking about current accounts where loss of access can cause significant problems then it would be different, but not having access to a year-long regular saver account for a few days mid-term really doesn't seem to me like a good reason for avoiding doing business with them, although everyone is free to pick and choose what organisations they want to use.

francoghezzi

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

WillPS said:

francoghezzi said:

Section62 said:

francoghezzi said:

DARLINGTON

Five days without the possibility to access our money after the internal mistake on the amount of interests. Still no change this morning. It's starting to sound quite like a farce

The block was applied on the 2nd, today is the 5th.  Two of the days between were non-working days, although some staff might have been in on the Saturday.

As the problem seems to be with mid-term interest additions rather than maturity I imagine the number of customers who planned to withdraw money or close their accounts over the weekend must be relatively small.

As a small building society it doesn't seem unreasonable they might need a couple of working days at least to get a full idea of the scope of the problem and design a fix which doesn't create additional problems further down the line.  Rather than "farce" I think it was prudent of them to block people taking the money and running, and also take a reasonable time to make sure the fix doesn't make things worse.

I also imagine if anyone was in desperate need of the money in one of the affected accounts then a phone call to Darlington might enable a withdrawal of the money required, minus the overpaid interest.  And if the error has caused you financial distress then I suspect Darlington would give appropriate consideration to a complaint and a request for reimbursement of your costs.

A bit of patience might be needed, but at 9:14am on the second working day of the year it shouldn't be totally unexpected that Darlington are still working on a resolution.

You are right. Enjoy. Am happy to be the only one who will take the money and leave at the earliest possibility. I don't like thinking that my savings are in some sort of 'Disneyland' like building societies. They have more than a quid not balanced in their books, I don't want even think that they closed on Saturday and on Sunday and enjoyed time off with all the mess that is going on. If they did it, well, that is another reason to stay away for me

I think your expectations are unreasonable.

I know, but am happy to 'come' from a century when every job was taken seriously and from an epoch when if the books didn't balance people were asked to stay a bit longer and put them right. Trust me, it was a better world :-)

Tired and exhausted people don't perform well and make mistakes.  If that happened (and it generally wasn't my working experience) then it wasn't necessarily a 'better world'.  Dragging people in from their holiday to 'fix' a problem - which in the scheme of things is a triviality - would be poor management... and in my view if there were a reason to avoid a financial institution then one that panics and risks making the situation worse would the the one to avoid, rather than one which takes rapid action to stop bad becoming worse and then figures out a full fix when the right people are available. 

The so-called 'Disneyland' like building societies often offer good value savings accounts, typically more generous than the larger ones.  If we were talking about current accounts where loss of access can cause significant problems then it would be different, but not having access to a year-long regular saver account for a few days mid-term really doesn't seem to me like a good reason for avoiding doing business with them, although everyone is free to pick and choose what organisations they want to use.

As I said if at Darlington are happy to have a Sunday roast while being out of pocket for a few million pounds am totally happy for them and their ethic of work. That is not 'my' ethic that is clearly something out of the present world. As always happy to be part of a minority

clairec666

Honestly, how many of us have actually been inconvenienced by Darlington's error?

Slinky

I would think that the vast majority of Darlington RS customers don't have a clue that there's an issue. They will have sent their money across on 2nd January, and will do so again on 2nd February, and be none the wiser that there's been a problem. That's probably why they have taken the IMO sensible decision NOT to email their customers alerting them to the issue, that for the vast majority will not be the slightest problem, thereby averting wasted additional stress all round.

The message is on their website. Why email everyone, get people logging into check, potentially crashing their website, and leading to loads of pointless communications trying to find out what's going on?

Users of this thread are not your typical saver IMO. Most people won't be checking their balances as often as we do.