Chip and Pin - At Banks

Bitstring , from the wonderful person Ronald Raygun said

?? My bank (if not others) provides reply paid envelopes for the purpose..

We get them from Bank Of Scotland, but not from HSBC or Barclays. It may reflect the lack of BOS branches where we are - there are still plenty of the other type.

However you still can't pay money in on-line which was the follow-up to earlier comments.

I think the convenient location bit affects relatively few people. Not to say that some people don't have a problem, just that when we're making generalisations, things that affect tiny minorities don't cut it.

Regarding the queue, most banks have automatic deposit services these days.

We do live in an age where there is attrition on what is considered convenient. People aren't, say prepared to walk a mile to get their shopping, but when I was little my mum used to walk me and my sister to the local market and back. A round trip of 3 miles.

At 14:04:09 on 13/03/2006, Simon Jerram delighted uk.finance by announcing:

Define relatively few. And does this definition of convenience involve you having to choose a bank based upon its branch locations?

What's a tiny minority in this case?

And most people prefer the security of a stamped deposit slip.

What, not ever? You can turn up with a pay-in book for any bank, and a pile of cheques, notes, and three bags full of coins, and pay them in, and not be charged?

Brilliant! I must try it sometime. The problem with many banks these days is that they charge you for using their cash machines to take money out of other banks' accounts, and perhaps even to charge you for paying money/cheques in over the counter going to accounts in another bank.

One organisation I help run uses CAF Bank, which doesn't have branches, and tells us to use HSBC branches for pay-ins because they have an arrangement with them not to charge fees which other banks might. But there's only one branch in town, and it's miles away in the busy centre, where you have to pay money to park! It'd probably be cheaper to pay a pay-in fee to some other bank. But so far I've been lucky and neither RBS nor BoS have made noises about charging when I've tried it on there instead.

I dare say that if I were not treasurer of two organisations I would almost certainly also only pay in cash extremely rarely.

I dread to think what I'd have to do if I ran a corner shop.

At 16:40:33 on 13/03/2006, Ronald Raygun delighted uk.finance by announcing:

No.

Where did I say that?

What bank does that then?

I've no idea, but one reads about it in the press, and some of the ones I use make a point of informing me that they do not make a charge. The exception proves the rule, dunnit?

It's what I understood you to mean, given what we were discussing, i.e. alternative means of paying money into a bank account in the absence of a convenient bank branch.

What did you mean, if not that? Not snail-mailing, I hope, since sending cash is risky, discouraged, and perhaps even prohibited.

Or perhaps you're a GiroBank customer and your information was limited to paying into your own account.

At 18:20:13 on 13/03/2006, Ronald Raygun delighted uk.finance by announcing:

So the word "mine" didn't convey any meaning to you?

Of course not. "Mine" just means "my something", and in context it seemed obvious to take that "something" to mean cash and cheques you are paying into your bank account. If you happen to bank with the Post Office's in-house bank, you should have declared the fact, as it would invalidate what I perceive to have been your point, since it seemed you were offering "going via the PO" as an *alternative* to popping into a local bank branch, but in your case (if indeed you bank with GiroBank, which I notice you've neglacted to confirm or deny), the PO *is* your local bank branch so yours is not really an alternative at all (you are still popping into your local branch).

You'll have to do better than that. AFAIK the fuss about charging is aimed at the ATMs that usually (always?) arent run by banks, usually in places like service stations, convenience stores, etc, so it could easily be to distinguish themselves from those ATMs rather than from other *banks* ATMs.

You may be right. The thought that ATMs might be run by non-banks had never even crossed my mind. I thought they all were, but that some banks were greedier than others and only made the facility available free to their own customers, while charging other banks' customers.

The confusing thing is that, what with so many bank branches closing down, you tend to find a lot of *bank* ATMs located at random non-bank sites, possibly but not necessarily sites of former banks, so how are you supposed to know whether any given one is bank-run or varmint-run?

At 23:54:15 on 13/03/2006, Ronald Raygun delighted uk.finance by announcing:

Which I don't.

My cash and cheques go in via the Post Office who never charge a fee. Nothing in that statement implies I can turn up with a pay-in book for any bank. It implies I use a Post Office account, or a bank who have an agreement with the Post Office.

So why didn't you say that in the first place, instead of inviting fruitless speculation?

Pillock.

At 09:58:02 on 14/03/2006, Ronald Raygun delighted uk.finance by announcing:

You're the only one speculating, pointlessly or otherwise. The majority seem capable of inferring my meaning.

That'll be the silent majority, will it?

You didn't really have anything helpful to say, did you? You made it sound like the PO was a useful convenient alternative to a bank branch, and instead it turns out that it isn't, unless and to the extent that most banks one is likely to want to pay in to ("any bank") turn out infact to have an arrangement with the PO such as you describe. So, is there a list?

There is a list on the Pots Office site

Those of us who live or work in Scotland (especially if they run a corner shop and post office) are less well catered for.

MikeW

The Post Office 2 in 1 card is administered by the Bank of Ireland. Chip and Signature was an afterthought, and here is how Irish cardhodlers will be treated if they are the victim of PIN based fraud:

Chips are down as banks will pin any loss on you

But beware. With new chip and PIN cards, many card issuers have changed their card terms and conditions following the introduction of new chip and Pin cards.

These new conditions state that the use of a PIN to verify a transaction is proof that the cardholder authorised the transaction