Does anyone have an RBS Royalties Gold Account?

Milky_Mocha

Before I get flamed for even thinking about opening an account that pays a pittance in interest I should mention that I've just been speaking to an RBS representative who listed the benefits of this account and I thought it might be worth considering. I just want to hear from someone who has one and actually found it worth the £12 monthly fee.

Even if its not worth the £12 they offered to give a 30 day free trial.

• Free family travel insurance
• Up to 60% off hotels in Europe (this is what first caught my attention)
• Extended warranties (Barclaycard recently stopped these)
• Free accidental death cover for you and your spouse (only applies to death on public transport so hardly worth taking if it wasn't free)
• Discounts on flights and Eurostar (apparently they use the internet to do the travel searches so could be competitve)
• Discounts on phone calls if you have a BT line (A certain %age of calls, I forget but it was quite good)
• Free home emergency service (covers disasters but also loss of utilities such as breakdown of central heating)
• Free card cover for any cc or dc's you hold with any bank
• Free sharedealing service

The list went on. And the good thing is these apply to existing as well as new customers.

It might be worth taking the free trial if you intend to book a holiday soon like I am.

Any thoughts? experiences?

pingu

Hi
i have been thinking about this for a long time but £12 per month(used to be £10) put me off.i have their current account.

instead i opened A&L premier account got the travel insurance free (£48 to add my son)

on a personal basis you have to work out the saving to justify the £144 annual fee!

Milky_Mocha

pingu wrote:

Hi
on a personal basis you have to work out the saving to justify the £144 annual fee!

The basic math does put it into perspective, doesn't it? I think I'll go with the free trial, book my holidays and then cancel.

Downsizing__for_sanity

We have this account, purely for the travel insurance, as I travel a lot with work. We booked our honeymoon to save the 10% on the brochure price, which saved us a good £1500. We got free lounge access and were promised an upgrade on the internal flights if possible. HOWEVER...they were as nice as pie UNTIL the airline went bust!!! We were informed the day before the wedding. I remember standing crying in the church during the weddng rehearsal. To cut a long story short, yes, they were providing an alternative, but from a different UK airport and nearly 24 hours earlier. Not too bad if it's a normal holiday, but the whole point was to get MARRIED, this being our honeymoon!
Royalties Travel Services said, tough, complain all you like, we don't care if you take your 4 bank accounts away from RBS, we are a completely separate company. I tool this up with my local branch (who were very helpful actually). However, even they couldn't get all our money back (90% of it) and ended up giving us free Royalties Gold to make up the balance. Verdict: RBS good, Travel Service pants!

KTF

Milky_Mocha wrote:

[1]Free family travel insurance [2]Up to 60% off hotels in Europe (this is what first caught my attention) [3]Extended warranties (Barclaycard recently stopped these) [4]Free accidental death cover for you and your spouse (only applies to death on public transport so hardly worth taking if it wasn't free) [5]Discounts on flights and Eurostar (apparently they use the internet to do the travel searches so could be competitve) [6]Discounts on phone calls if you have a BT line (A certain %age of calls, I forget but it was quite good) [7]Free home emergency service (covers disasters but also loss of utilities such as breakdown of central heating) [8]Free card cover for any cc or dc's you hold with any bank [9]Free sharedealing service

The list went on. And the good thing is these apply to existing as well as new customers.

It might be worth taking the free trial if you intend to book a holiday soon like I am.

Any thoughts? experiences?

Just to pick through a few of the 'benefits'.

1. you can get this free from A&L with their premier account.
2. The last time I checked they dont search the whole market and you can find cheaper prices yourself if you do a bit of digging online.
3. Never had the need for these. fine if they are free but I wouldnt pay any money for them.
4. Hardly worth having and whatever payout will be a pittance.
5. See 2.
6. I doubt they will be able to get near 18866.com et al when it comes to phone charges. See the article on this site for more details.
7. Might already be offered under your home insurance policy.
8. See 7.
9. Dont have a need for it

I have an RBS account as well and have no need to upgrade for a
something that I wont use (no matter how many leaflets they put in my bank statements offering me to do so.

Btw, 30 day free trial is the same as saying 1 month free (except 30 days 'sounds' longer) and as its 12£ a month you only save 12£ no matter how you put it

Milky_Mocha

KTF wrote:

as its 12£ a month you only save 12£ no matter how you put it

Unless I suppose I am able to get a genuine discount on the travel before I cancel.

Ok so the verdict is: its not really worth it so I shouldn't get carried away. I was a bit impressed by the central heating / plumbing cover but I will check how much it costs to obtain separate quotes for this.