A great and trustworthy bank. A lot better than some of its competitors. (Alliance & Leicester)

Member Name: dndewar

Product:	Alliance & Leicester
Date:	30/10/09 (35 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fast Trasnactions, Fast Cheque Deposits, Great Fixed intrest of 6% for a year. Good Customer Service

Disadvantages: Takes a little longer than expected to set up an account.

Alliance and Leicester is a growing a very successful bank, with a lot of help from the banking group santander.
I have only had an A+L account for over 3 months and find it one of the best banks I've been with.
I have split the review inot sections which I beleive is important for a bank to be successful and reted them /10 along with a comment.
In this review I'll be reviewing the Alliance and Leicester Current Accounts

Interest Rates: 9/10
For the first year once you have join A+L they award you 6% AER for balances up to £2,500 which is one of the highest interests rates possible at the moment. This means that with you £2,500+ kept in there you could earn £150, which you can spend on what ever you want. Anything above £2,500 will earn 0.1%. This doesn't mean that if you have £2,501 you'll only earn 0.1%. It means that if you had £2,501 the £1 would get interest of 0.1%. After that yeat interset goes down to 1% which isn't too bad for a current account.

Money Deposits: 10/10
This bank is the fastest I've ever known. I had recently sent a cheque and 2 days later it had been cashed. Also, as Alliance and Leicester are partners of the Royal Post, you can send you cheque for free (as long as you send it via a post office and not post box)
Also sending money between one person and another who have both got A+L accounts. Money is sent and recieved pretty much imedietly. Accounts between other banks is much slower. Can take up to 3 days but thats about average for that kind of transfer.
You can also make super quick cash deposits by going to the post office and handing over the cash, and they'll add that money into your account.

Security: 7/0
When logging into internet banking they always ask for codes, and if the server doesn't recognise your comupter, asks you a person question of yours. I find it vety secure, but not a secure as it could be. I want it to have a few more questions to ask you before you can log in. Though over all it is very secure.

Speed of Applying for an account: 8/10
It takes about 2 weeks in total to setup all you accounts, cards and codes before you can really start using the account. Which isn't to long but it could be a lot faster.

Customer Service: 10/10
If ever you have a problem, they'll always try to help. The last person I talked to over the phone to resolve a problem was british so you can clearly understand the person. If you have a simple to solve problem they can get it solved strait away, but more complex and it may take longer. Atleast this service does solve your problems without having to ask constantly.

Summary: A brilliant bank which makes handling your money much asier than some other banks.