Cash for Opening/Changing Bank Accounts

Section62

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82106011#Comment_82106011

Certainly is… the Getty Images caption data gives the date 8 January 2009.

https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/woman-looks-at-adverts-offering-savings-rates-and-current-news-photo/84208397

For real nostalgia, the caption text includes "The Bank of England on Thursday cut its key lending rate by half a percentage point to 1.5 percent, the lowest level in its 315-year history, to help stabilise inflation amid a sharp economic downturn. The monetary policy committee's decision to cut the rate from 2.0 percent left British borrowing costs at their lowest level since formation of the Bank of England in 1694."

One of the funniest comments under the BBC article suggests they have saved money by using an old picture rather than a newer one, and other comments suggest they've used a defunct bank so they don't get accused of favouritism or giving away free advertising.

eskbanker

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82106021#Comment_82106021

But is there any evidence that banks not making much tangible effort at retention suffer noticeably with higher loss of customers?

Alderbank

Good point, they've always been obsessive about product placement.

Other retail banks are available…

subjecttocontract

I have no idea but, I don't see why they would pay switch bonuses to try to attract new customers (& retain existing as in the Co-Op ) if they weren't in need of them. Perhaps they have explained their reason to their shareholders.....which I am not.

Nasqueron

To date I have earned £1970.04 (the pence was from that Virgin regular saver 12% bonus offer for a switch and stay in lieu of cash!), not bad for a few minutes work.

Some banks do offer incentives to customers, serial switches retain useful accounts like the FD current account with the 7% saver £300 a month or the Santander 8% saver mentioned above (or indeed the Edge Saver paying 6% on up to £4k). NatWest have the digital regular saver paying 5.5% or whatever it is on £150 a month but you can stack it to £5k maximum and they have the reward account paying £5 (soon to be £4) a month for a £2 fee.

The only pain for me is that retaining these accounts disqualifies from switch bonuses in the future, albeit I am also constrained by the time restrictions they also apply.

eskbanker

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82106045#Comment_82106045

I'm not sure that it's a question of needing new customers as such, in that the numbers involved are minuscule and I can't see them moving the dial meaningfully - it's still only about 1-1.5% of accounts that are switched each year, each of which generally involves one bank losing a customer and another gaining one, so my guess is that it's largely a bit of window-dressing with the marketing budget.

The fact that about 99% of accounts aren't switched presumably signifies that there's no particular need to spend significant sums of money on customer retention.

That said, it's only natural that, in a competitive market, individual players will choose their own priorities about how to structure their offerings, so some will go with switching incentives, others will pay credit interest on current accounts, others will offer high-paying regular savers or other savings accounts, others will highlight non-financial aspects such as customer service, etc…

tichtich

For what it's worth, Nationwide has been paying a bonus of £100 per year for the last few years to its account holders. That incentivises me to remain with them, and I fully intend to do so. I've been with them for about 40 years now! However I'm wondering whether to set up a second account, just for switching.

wmb194

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82108748#Comment_82108748

I’d recommend you setup a second account for resilience. Accounts get blocked and systems can go down for a while so it’s useful to have a backup.