Choose your bank wisely

Let’s face it the Banking sector is a pretty seriously damaged brand.

If they are not in the cross hairs because they caused a global credit crisis, they have a computer system malfunction that disadvantages many tens of thousands of consumers.

If they had a slim chance of repairing the damage to their brand they then go and mess that up by trying to manipulate the interest rate mechanism.

I suppose at least one good thing that has come out of the latter point is that more people in the UK today know what LIBOR stands for that at any point in its history!

It is however the day to day dealing with Banks that would make me laugh if it wasn’t so incredibly frustrating.

Take Santander (please someone take Santander!).

We have a client who wants us to review all of their financial arrangements. They have given us a letter of authority.

We sent that to Santander and as per usual they did not reply with the information we requested (nothing unusual there then). So to make sure we continue to provide a decent customer service we pick up the phone and call them to find out why not and when we might expect to get said information.

“We can’t talk to you I am afraid”

“Why not?”

“The date of birth on the letter of authority you have sent us is different to the date of birth on our system”

So we cross reference the date of birth with other documents we hold and low and behold the date of birth on the authority letter is in fact correct. It is Santander who have the wrong one!

They effectively want us to tell them the wrong date of birth (which of course we don’t know) in order to pass their security checks.

I know you really couldn’t make it up could you?

So the client doesn’t get the service they deserve because we have provided a letter of authority fully completed with the right date of birth, correct reference numbers and correct address.

So what advice can we give our client?

I know the advice I want to give – change banks and get one who knows what they are doing. The only problem I have is I don’t know one who is any good at all – any suggestions gratefully received.

Photo credit: Pranav Bhatt