Banks

[NorfolkAYA]

Thinking of changing banks, who does everyone bank with?. Pros and cons?. 

 

Cheers Pete 

[mossy835]

im with halifax.been with years now find them very good, i wont change.

[vmaxphil]

Started out with giro ended up with santander due to takeovers no problem in 40 years

[krugerandsmith]

27 minutes ago, NorfolkAYA said:

Thinking of changing banks, who does everyone bank with?. Pros and cons?. 

 

Cheers Pete 

Whats the difference between Banks and Mount Rushmore? .... Answer;  Banks are only Two Faced.

[Bobba]

I was with the Midland. It was taken over by HSBC and I stayed. Our mortgage was with them. No problems. My main reason for staying is thar they're worldwide. I am fortunate enough to have travelled quite extensively over the years and still do. HSBC is  available in most countries and in Capital Cities and they have been helpful to me in Vancouver, New York and Singapore. You will not find a Lloyd's, Halifax, Santander, or NatWest abroad when you need them.

[TIGHTCHOKE]

I was with Natwest from the age of 16, in those days you could ask to see the Manager and he could request you visit him.

I stayed with them for years until they started to cut costs, you could never see anyone without an appointment and when I did need some help and advice they were useless.

I moved to the Nationwide and have had superb service for the last 8 years. They seem to treat you like it matters to them, very professional.

[NorfolkAYA]

Currently with NatWest but they just closed our local branch so have to travel to pay money in now which I did last week and ended up waiting 20 mins to see some one ?

[Guest]

Santander .get interest when pay utility bills I have had nearly £800 I. Interest in about 3yr pay gas,elec ,council tax water 

can fault it .swopped from Halifax as was getting nothing from them 

Edited November 19, 2017 by Guest

[NorfolkAYA]

I've heard Santander are bad for fraud?. Apparently people target them as there cyber security isn't great?. 

[BrowningDJC]

Swapped everything to nationwide a while ago, faultless service and won’t shut branches.

[Wb123]

Halifax, they offered a big interest free overdraft whilst studying and have never had reason to leave. 

 

Beforehand I was with nationwide but I think their relative lack of branches would have posed issues had I stayed with them. My better half stuck with bank of Ireland for a long time but the lack of branches and very slow money transfers eventually pushed her to Halifax. 

[krugerandsmith]

40 minutes ago, BrowningDJC said:

Swapped everything to nationwide a while ago, faultless service and won’t shut branches.

I have been with them for years, in the good old days when they paid out 12% interest. Now simple mathematics ....  Low interest = no interest.

[ips]

is there any account that actually pays interest, I think my RBS one is about 0.01% ?

[Wb123]

1 hour ago, ips said:

is there any account that actually pays interest, I think my RBS one is about 0.01% ?

When they can borrow from the Bank of England at next to nothing and are so limited in who they can lend to by historical standards my understanding is that the banks simply don't need our money. In older times they needed our money to lend out but now current accounts and savings accounts only yield any profit via charges or people sticking with the same provider for credit. 

 

I suspect it it is only a matter of time before charging for current accounts is the norm unless there is a significant shift in how the system works. Halifax have looked after my current account and credit card very well for years and it won't have made them a penny, not viable for the long term. 

[ph5172]

To be fair i think they are all much of a muchness. 

Unless you want something like a bundled account with the extras such as breakdown and the like i don't really see a great difference, i am with my bank because i have been for years... in no way is it 'loyalty' its just for my day to day needs they do the job and they still have a over the counter service should i still need it.

I understand changing is simple now and requires little effort 

[old man]

TSB. just does what it says it will.

Very friendly staff too.

[washerboy]

This day and age they are all the same.im with tsb because I needed an account to have a mortgage with them.

their opening hours are a total waste of time as I’m at work until they are closed ,I do all my banking on line I don’t really need any of their services 

[amateur]

I was with Natwest for 45 years through its changes to RBS. The service became worse and the local staff unhelpful, so last year switched to Lloyds.

Total transformation - friendly staff, helpful advice on reducing potential Estate Duty and the Club Lloyds account pays interest of 2% on balances of up to £5000.

Admittedly their ISA pays naff all, but I can easily switch money on line to maximise my interest.

[JohnfromUK]

I have heard very good reports of both Nationwide and Handelsbanken.

I have a (virtually dormant) business account with Lloyds - who have declined in helpfulness over the years, and an account with (a branded version of) Intelligent Finance, a Lloyds Banking Group/Halifax/Bank of Scotland subsidiary now I believe who used to be excellent and pay high interest, but the interest rates are now far from the best, though the service is still good.  I don't believe they take on new customers now, though not 100% sure.

[das]

There are no good banks, only some are a little worse than others.

Look at the current base rate then the lowest rate you can borrow at then laugh at the money they are making from you.

Not many years ago, I had a savings account with about 4K in it.  It used to yield around £53 a quarter, I withdrew it when

the interst dropped to £1.23 per quarter..Robbers.

[100milesaway]

Santander pay 1*5 % on a current account up to £20,000 and up to 3% off some utility bills on D/D. from Auntie.

 

[loriusgarrulus]

Been with HSBC since it was Midland for over 43 years. Never had a problem with them. 

The one I wouldn't reccomend is Barclays as OH had a lot of problems with them. Some friends also lost their house with them calling in a business loan secured on the house for no obvious reason despite the business doing well and them paying the payments on time. Barclays then sold the house for half its value, just enough to cover the loan. They probably couldn't get away with it these days, but I wouldn't trust them.

[figgy]

Where are our resident bankers when you need them.  Come AVB you know the system all the pros and cons. 

[button]

22 minutes ago, loriusgarrulus said:

Been with HSBC since it was Midland for over 43 years. Never had a problem with them. 

The one I wouldn't reccomend is Barclays as OH had a lot of problems with them. Some friends also lost their house with them calling in a business loan secured on the house for no obvious reason despite the business doing well and them paying the payments on time. Barclays then sold the house for half its value, just enough to cover the loan. They probably couldn't get away with it these days, but I wouldn't trust them.

With all due respect I think there is more to that story. Loans do not get called in for no reason, there has to be a default event. 

[SxS]

5 hours ago, JohnfromUK said:

I have heard very good reports of both Nationwide and Handelsbanken.

I tried Handelsbanken a few years ago... they let local branches have a lot of autonomy *but* you could only open an account with whichever branch was local to your home or work.  Unfortunately mine seemed rather less good at opening accounts than others, and didn't do what they'd said they were going to do with respect to a quick mortgage decision, so never did get round to moving away from RBS.

Personal banking is very much a commodity product so, unless you go for one of the very exclusive banks, I very much doubt there is much to choose between any of them these days especially if you do the majority online.