| Product: |
Abbey National |
| Date: |
30/04/08 (193 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Many services
Disadvantages: incompetence on all levels, call centre staff are really thick, no help at all
Abbey are now part of the Santander group, which is apparently the largest banking group in the world. So hopefully with a large conglomerate behind them Abbey would be a decent bank to go with, right?
Abbey has numerous services that they offer at the moment and I've had the misfortune to use three of them, a current account, a credit card and a mortgage. That was in a short period from 2006 to 2008. Now I don't have any services with them such is their competence.
Lets start with the current account. When I opened my account in 2006 the interest rate was okay. Unfortunately this was an introduction rate which dropped about three months after I had started. By this time I had been sucked in to a credit card and moved house and had a mortgage with them. Although that said the current account wasn't that bad. The problems though were elsewhere.
The credit card also had a good introduction rate to start with 0% on purchases for three months. Once this good deal ended though the rate went up and the way the interest was calculated went to a different planet. The problem I had with their credit card was even if I paid off all my purchases I would pick up an interest charge of the days between the bill and my payment. I only worked this out when I paid off a month and then had no purchases the next month only to receive a bill for £2 in interest fees. This credit card was finally dropped about six months after I had started it.
The mortgage I had with Abbey was a decent one for the time and throughout the two years I had it there were no problems. I paid them on time and they gave me a statement every now and then. The only time it became a problem was when the two year discount tracker rate was due to move up to their base rate. I now had a Financial advisor and he started putting things in place to change the mortgage and keep it on decent lower rate. Abbey though had other ideas and as I had arranged them mortgage directly with them they wouldn't deal with my advisor and I had to do all the leg work. Even though I started the ball rolling a full four months before the rate change, Abbey dragged their feet long enough to delay the switch over to the very last month of the discount rate. With the paperwork done by me and my financial advisor sorting out the new mortgage I thought everything was done and dusted. The Abbey account was paid off and the new lender was good to go.
That was until Abbey took out a payment at the higher rate from my current account (in another bank now) the following month. This was bad as it dropped my account beyond the overdraft limit. I was now paying for two mortgages, one at a new lender and one with Abbey, which should have been closed. Worse was to follow as once I had contacted their call centre they refused to return the funds until they had 'cleared' their account, which could be up to 10 days. Then there would be a further unspecified delay of 5 days before it got back to my account. Despite requests and pleas they would not budge so I had to go cap in hand to my current account provider.
Through my current account provider I was able to fill out a form, cancel the Abbey direct debit that should have been cancelled anyway and apply to get my money back. The overdraft limit was increased for a few months until I got the funds back and the charge for going over my limit was dropped. I got the funds back in about two weeks, which was too long in my book, but at least my bank was trying to help me out.
Unlike Abbey, which was trying to make me bankrupt.
Even though I had actually over paid the mortgage by about £100 and they had given me a letter stating this I got a letter from their debt collection department asking for two months worth of payments, the one they took and I got back, plus the next months. I tried to get some sense out of the call centre, but I had keep going one higher. Even the managers were useless so I had to solider on until I got to the complaints department and finally met someone with more than a shared brain cell.
He sorted out the mess, registered my complaint and finally three months after I changed mortgage lenders, I got back the £100 they owed me. Later I got another letter with £30 as a bribe not to tell the FSA what a waste of space they really were.
As a recall then the current account was okay and worked well for the nine months I had it before I found one with a better rate. The credit card was cheap for a few months before they started clawing money back through ramped interest charges. Finally the mortgage was a complete and utter disaster when I wanted out, with no help, lots of time wasting, rubbish call centres and incompetence on all levels. I will in future avoid using this bank altogether as once you are in you won't ever get out.
(c)2008 buzzard_cad
This review may be found at other websites under the same user name and is also written by me.
Summary: Once your in you won't get out!
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