If you could close down one financial institution

Bayblue

Having gone through the experience of my own company being made insolvent I wouldn't chose to close any institution down. If the service is bad, or I don't agree with their ethics then I just take my custom elsewhere.

babyharry5

Without a doubt has to Be HFC or Beneficial finance
the biggest loan sharks in the world!
taught to sell credit protection and additional policies as a 'package' - would cost customers thousands extra

unfairchargesnatwest

It's taken several months of listening to and reading Martin's advice, but I've finally stopped being loyal to NAT WEST, after 14 years ! They charged me £28 for a 24 hour overdraft of £-21.64.:mad: They called it a 'Maintenance Charge'. They claim that unless it is the banks error for being o/d, the charge still stands. The slight debit in my account was for a slightly higher than expected auto payment for gas bill...saw the debit 24 hours later and transferred £25 back into account, to be back in credit.
For such a small error on my part, they are absolute Fagin's....they'll take every penny they can and I feel Nat West prey on small accounts for those minor debits. I'm off to another account, and will keep on switching if need be!

IWantToBeFree_2

Because whilst being in debt, I have always been upto date on payments etc, I've not really had any run in's with financial institutions, however, I would like to nominate HSBC.

I had a student account with them, £1k overdraft in the first year, and it increased by £250 in year 2 and another £250 in year 3. Only problem was, is that 10 days after I became a student, I stopped being a student, but despite telling them this, they just kept the student account as a student account.... I ran up the overdraft, that much was my fault, but as it was interest free, it wasn't a big deal and I had my own payment plan to pay it off before it became interest bearing. They were supposed to reduce it by £500 a year over 3 years and after 3 years it would become interest bearing, however, last summer, they pulled the plug on the whole thing and unless people then paid £10 a month they were charging interests on grad accounts, so £120 a year to service the overdraft, or, 14% APR.

Obviously this wasn't just me, but thousands of people in the same boat, they cited reasons such as 'need to understand cost of borrowing' yet were just pushing people into debt they couldn't afford to pay coming straight out of uni. I was lucky, cos I had a job, so I cleared the balance, and closed the account, wrote to them and told them they were a bunch of **** and that was that.

However, they then registered a missing payment on my credit record, how on earth you can miss a payment on a current account is beyond me... fuming, its the only one on there in years!

A few weeks later they backed down on their decision, but I wasn't prepared to hang around paying 14% interest.

EDIT - Also Abbey, I have a credit card with them, with a zero balance on (need to close the account) and they seem to think that sending me one or two letters a week offering me a loan of £15k is acceptable....

Pinklint_3

It is too hard to choose, there are so many!!!! It would have to be G E Money the *** bleep, bleep, ***. This might be easier if you could name the one you would like to keep although saying that I can't think of one for that either! !!

Bluediamond

HSBC and Lloyds come in joint 1st I am afraid.

HSBC for trying to get us to agree to a managed loan to pay back what we owe and when we get on our DMP they send us threatening letters every month still.

Lloyds as they bombarded us continually with calls and letters when we were struggling and they never seemed to stop. It was relentless and they caused me and my DH many nights of broken sleep.

Cannot and will not EVER forgive them.

BlueDiamond

moneymeltdown

It just has to be HSBC...I remember being told many years ago (after asking for their help in a difficult money situation) "to grow up" by one of their staff!

I have been subjected to years and years of bank charges which HSBC claim are justified! Unauthorised overdraft charges..why then do they continue to let me withdraw cash when I am about to go over my overdraft ???:mad:

I hate hate hate their call centres so much...I am so glad I have walked away from them on the advice of CCCS and left that huge stinking overdraft sitting there (temporarily..I will be paying it off pro rata for the next million years!)

payingfornowt

I remember HSBC or Midland Bank as they were back then coming into my school and letting us open bank accounts with them. Great marketing by them but now from my experiences with them this is like inviting a crack dealer in to give kids sweets.

Surely this shouldnt be allowed?

petal62

I would close Lloyds TSB,all my other creditors accepted my offers 5 months ago, they are still sending me letters threatening court action, and saying I have never replied even though I have all my replies in writing. They also threatened to ring me everyday until I paid in full, when I sent a written complaint about this behaviour I got a letter saying they had received the complaint and it would take 28 days to reply, 4 months later still waiting for the reply and still getting solicitor letters threaten court action. What maddens me most is I owe them the least.

natweststaffmember

savvykaz wrote: »

Nat West here too - although I did manage to reclaim £2,250 in unlawful bank charges :j

Firstplus, too!!!

Well that's me out of a job, pmsl.

FSA because quite frankly they appear to be useless. Hardship definition please?