Nationwide's Call Centre is bl**dy useless

I can sympathise with your circumstances - the UK really has not got the hang of service industries.

But what if your "helpful" call centre woman moves to First Direct etc?

If you are moving for products, OK. But better service is at the whim of the individual.

Isn't that what its for?

Nationwide gave me a 'Telephone Pass Number', to be used with their automated phonebanking service, and a 'Personal Security Code', which is what they ask for when I speak to someone in customer service. Neither of these are the same as your card PIN, which they certainly shouldn't ask you for.

Chris

Yes Nationwide are hopeless. Rude, incompetent, useless.

I received a considerable (compensation) payment from them earlier this year as a result of their shabby procedures, lack of "journaling" by their telephone support staff, and out and out incompetence in sending credit-cards, etc., to my former address.

Oh, I had to involve the Financial Ombudsman. Up to then they appear to have a policy of wasting my time as much as possible hoping I'd go away, but I just noted my time at £100/hr, informing them of their mounting bill at each step. In the end, because I was right and could demonstrate as such, the house came tumbling down.

Rob

Are you suggesting then, that if a bank (or other business) completely messes the situation up and you have good evidence to prove it, you can basically say, this took 20 hours to resolve and I value my time at 50/hr - so please pay me?

Surely they would say "no" - even with the relevant Ombudsman involved?

Isn't that exactly what the banks do to their customers when they have to carry out extra work to sort out their problems Why should the banks get away with imposing charges for work performed and then be able to just say 'no' when a customers tries the same thing?

I agree with you that this should not be the case. If you have spent ages sorting their c*ck-ups out then they owe you.

But all I was saying that I was surprised that claiming your time at X per hr then saying you spent Y hrs on it, seemed to work with the bank.

Would they: a) not demand proof that you are worth X /hr b) demand proof that it took Y hrs c) not pay up anyhow because they don't want to set precedents and want to keep the money.

Or, does the involvement of an Ombudsman overrule this.

Their online banking service is woeful as well.

I have an e-savings account, but I can't just have that, I must have a flexaccount (which I don't want or need) as well. And any money can only go via the flexaccount. You can't transfer directly to or from a flexaccount. So (a) transfer money to the flexaccount, (b) wait a couple of days to see if has arrived yet, (c) if it has, manually transfer the money yourself. Or forget to do that, and have it languish in the flexaccount at a much lower interest rate.

I ahso have a credit card. I wanted readvising of my PIN, so I left a secure message requesting this. The reply came back, "sorry, your request doesn't fall into that category - you'll have to telephone our customer service centre". They offered a number of subjects, none of which seemed appropriate, so I'd selected "general enquiry" (from memory). Apparently the problem was that it wasn't a "general enquiry" - but as you couldn't select a subject of your own choice, you had no option really. Of course the dumbo at the other end could have processed the request anyway, but that would have required some degree of intelligence and initiative.

Sadly the PIN on my wife's card was different from mine, so when she tried to use the card the PIN was rejected. She was in Estonia at the time. I wanted to know if they could get her PIN set to the same as mine. After all the computer knows what the PIN is, and it wouldn't be rocket science programming. "We can't do that, as we don't know your PIN." Clever that. As an alternative, they suggested that she should contact them to get readvised of her PIN. Even cleverer under the circumstances.

At least the e-savings account has one of the better interest rates, and the credit card is still one of the best deals for foreign currency transactions. If they didn't have the edge, I'd run a mile from them.

Brian

The banks are bigger than you, have more muscle, make fat profits, and would relentlessly grind you down until you gave up in despair.

Brian

Not enough Chiefs. Too many Indians!

You were lucky to even get a reply. I sent them a secure message asking them to update their records with my new address, but they just ignored it. That was sent a 'general enquiry'. If that's not general enough I don't know what it.

I'm not sure if this has changed recently, but I was surprised to discover that even though you can change your Flexaccount card PIN at an ATM, you can't change your credit card PIN, even at one of Nationwide's own machines. To change it, they have to send you a form, which you enter your required new PIN on and mail it back to them. It all seemed very insecure.

Chris

They are.

They do.

They do.

Your milage may vary.

Yes, except I used a figure of £100/hr.

Wrong on both counts (just my sample of two).

A small point..............how do you think the card gets to the branch in the first place? Err, that would be the post then!

And no, it is the standard royal mail that is used as cards are not actually issued from the banks anyway - there are a few card manufacturing cos producing the cards for all the UK banks!!!

MC

WOuld you not have to give some evidence about your self-value? What if you wree a student or unemployed? Or is a realistic arbitrary figure OK?

All you need to do is advise a supervisor there that any of your time you are required to spend sorting out their problems will cost them £100/hr. Make sure they understand this, have noted it, and you get the name of the person concerned.

Realistic arbitrary figure? This depends on you, but let's put it this way: even the most senior people at their end are not paid £100/hr so at least they begin to value your time.

I don't know about Nationwide but HSBC seem to have their own postal system. When I applied for my credit card I had to pick it up from the branch, the envelope that I picked up had my name and address on but was delivered to the branch. The envelope also had a box to fill in to forward the envelope to another branch.

I live overseas, and a couple of banks have now informed me that because the country I live in is not considered to have a secure enough postal system, they will no longer be able to send my ATM and credit cards to me there. Instead, they have asked for a UK address where they can send them, presumably so that someone there can forward them on to me.

Quite how they believe that sending a credit card to an address which I don't live at, and then having another person forward it on to me is going to be any more secure than sending the card direct, I just don't know.

Chris

"Chris Blunt" wrote

Presumably, they expect you to collect the card(s) in person when you visit the UK?

Unless you never visit the UK now - in which case, I'm wondering why you want UK cards anyway?

I do visit the UK, but only about once a year. Its unlikely that my visits would coincide with the renewal date of the card, so this would result in me holding an expired card for most of the time.

The reason for wanting UK cards is because most of my income originates there and is paid into a UK bank account.

Chris