Bank practices or branch practices that have ceased....

7sefton

My local Homebase had a branch of Abbey National (don’t think it had a counter service, just interview rooms)

And full Abbey National branches pioneered the use of coffee shops in them - Costa was their franchise partner 

mab48

For a while the old HSBC branch in my local town was a bit quirky. The cash machines were all inside so when the branch was shut you had to swipe your bank card at the entrance to get in. Once in there were lots of different machines, mostly for cash but some specifically for paying in and printing statements.

Also there were a lot of different names for debit cards over the years i.e. Switch, Solo, Visa Electron, Maestro - no idea what any of the differences were between them?

flaneurs_lobster

mab48 said:

For a while the old HSBC branch in my local town was a bit quirky. The cash machines were all inside so when the branch was shut you had to swipe your bank card at the entrance to get in. 

My city centre had these for a while ("Vestibule Banking"). They were removed when they were being used as phone boxes after these were all removed.

Nasqueron

mab48 said:

For a while the old HSBC branch in my local town was a bit quirky. The cash machines were all inside so when the branch was shut you had to swipe your bank card at the entrance to get in. Once in there were lots of different machines, mostly for cash but some specifically for paying in and printing statements.

Also there were a lot of different names for debit cards over the years i.e. Switch, Solo, Visa Electron, Maestro - no idea what any of the differences were between them?

Solo was for deposit accounts and for people who didn't qualify for the Switch card (which was a cheque guarantee and cash card) - teenagers for example. Switch was merged with Maestro which is an international debit and prepaid card scheme in a similar vein, owned by Mastercard. Visa Electron was basically the same as Maestro. There are other technical and security differences which I am sure someone will explain though there is some discussion here:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/21266/difference-between-maestro-visa-debit

ChirpyChicken

Nasqueron said:

mab48 said:

For a while the old HSBC branch in my local town was a bit quirky. The cash machines were all inside so when the branch was shut you had to swipe your bank card at the entrance to get in. Once in there were lots of different machines, mostly for cash but some specifically for paying in and printing statements.

Also there were a lot of different names for debit cards over the years i.e. Switch, Solo, Visa Electron, Maestro - no idea what any of the differences were between them?

Solo was for deposit accounts and for people who didn't qualify for the Switch card (which was a cheque guarantee and cash card) - teenagers for example. Switch was merged with Maestro which is an international debit and prepaid card scheme in a similar vein, owned by Mastercard. Visa Electron was basically the same as Maestro. There are other technical and security differences which I am sure someone will explain though there is some discussion here:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/21266/difference-between-maestro-visa-debit

Remember being told i could only get a solo account card from Halifax, had to wait 6 months before they would let me have a proper switch card

Rob5342

mab48 said:

For a while the old HSBC branch in my local town was a bit quirky. The cash machines were all inside so when the branch was shut you had to swipe your bank card at the entrance to get in. Once in there were lots of different machines, mostly for cash but some specifically for paying in and printing statements.

I remember the Lloyd's near me being like that. They had two cash machines in the lobby plus a desk with paying in slips and envelopes on and a very narrow slot on the wall you could post your deposits through. I think they called it Deposit point. 

TheBanker

Nasqueron said:

mab48 said:

For a while the old HSBC branch in my local town was a bit quirky. The cash machines were all inside so when the branch was shut you had to swipe your bank card at the entrance to get in. Once in there were lots of different machines, mostly for cash but some specifically for paying in and printing statements.

Also there were a lot of different names for debit cards over the years i.e. Switch, Solo, Visa Electron, Maestro - no idea what any of the differences were between them?

Solo was for deposit accounts and for people who didn't qualify for the Switch card (which was a cheque guarantee and cash card) - teenagers for example. Switch was merged with Maestro which is an international debit and prepaid card scheme in a similar vein, owned by Mastercard. Visa Electron was basically the same as Maestro. There are other technical and security differences which I am sure someone will explain though there is some discussion here:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/21266/difference-between-maestro-visa-debit

There were also Delta cards, which were Visa's version of Switch. They got re-branded as Visa Debit at some point.

lr1277

Thinking about this thread and the many switching threads, in my estimation it was more of a cash economy till the 2000's.

Would the current conditions of switching have been workable back then (if switching were a thing and technically possible)?

I did pay for a few things by card but I also paid for many things by cash. Meaning many trips to the cash machine. Had very few standing orders and direct debits. I suspect the cash withdrawls back then wouldn't have met any switching conditions.

Having said that, in the mid 90's, I manually switched 3 times.

First time because I joined a bank subsidiary so my salary had to be paid into one of the bank's accounts.

Then when I no longer worked for them to Lloyds. Nothing wrong with Lloyds but I heard really good things about FD and I switched to them. I don't remember it being painful, but perhaps I am looking at it through rose tinted glasses.

gsmh

I have moved my main current account dozens of times since I was 18. Very much a manual process then, of course, but always interesting. I’ve been with pretty much every bank going since then, given I was 18 in 1975! The only banks I haven’t had accounts with are the outliers like Reliance and Bank of Cyprus (now Cynergy). Some ‘switches’ happened when the bank I was with was bought up by another - like when the York County Savings Bank was swallowed up by the TSB, or when TSB became LloydsTSB, or when Lewis’s Bank took on the Lloyds Bank branding. It has all been a very interesting journey!

ChirpyChicken

Not a bank practice but the days when getting cash back at super markets was a thing! On ya switch card