Crap Banks | NatWest is a Crap Bank
Behind the media guff about “the credit crunch” crisis am I alone in failing to see the most relevant headline being used:
Banks are CRAP
Here’s my experience of a crap bank - Nat West - feel free to share yours - add your twopennyworth to the comments at the end.
It takes little to please me - give me a fresh-from-the-oven Pasty at lunchtime with flaked pastry and proper filling served quickly and politely and that’s me happy well in to the afternoon. What I don’t want to spend my lunchtime doing is standing in a twenty deep queue waiting to be served by one of three cashiers at NatWest only to find that when my turn eventually comes around they are unable to process an electronic money transfer to an RBS (same group of bankers) and tell me to join another long queue for the “information” team who should be able to fulfil my request but for a fee!
Now I wouldn’t want to promote the theory I always view things from a negative aspect - yes I have written at length about crap jobs and am want to highlight crap supermarket price offers but my recent experiences with Crap Bank NatWest forces me to once again wag a finger.
Natwest Lose Cheques - Sure Sign of a Crap Bank
Earlier this year I had the good fortuned to receive a cheque payable in US dollars from the small online store Amazon. It has continually been a frustration that all UK banks charge an extortionate fee to process these foreign currency cheques claiming they are risking the liability of the cheque not being honoured once sent back to the States for clearance - highly possible with fly by night set online setups such as Amazon. NatWest somehow manage not to notice the huge written message to emphasise the $ sign and my statement revealed the the sterling value had been credited instead of the exchange rate. Two daysl later the transaction was reversed but there was no sign of the correct value entering my statement. Phone calls were dealt with by empty promises of “we’ll call you back”and for the first time I had to endure the Natwest Branch Queue - a chilling experience to be surrounded by posters and displays offering a variety of credit cards including a new product that beggars belief 0% credit cards (check the small print) and mesmerising deals to encourage balance transfers. To cut this rambling tale to the chase natwest lost the cheque and although they obviously acknowledge possession of it were unable to make good their failings leaving me to request a copy cheque
Crap Bank - NatWest
At the beginning of this post you will have read about the unacceptable length of queues at NatWest bank and the woeful short staffing only serving to make the whole high street bank experience worse. “There is another way” Sure - close your NatWest Account.
If only I had gone to the branch armed with the following news articles that announced the implementation of fast (same day) cash transfers between banks http://news.icm.ac.uk/business/faster-bank-transfers-start-today/482/ and http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7417303.stm
As I was less than impressed that I was expected to rejoin another long queue and then be expected to pay a fee for an electronic transfer I protested and to give credit where its due the young fellow behind the counter did offer “Another Way” - “Err you can withdraw the cash here from me then wander over to RBS and pay it in” which is precisely what I did.
Perhaps these are small contributions to the bigger picture of banking chaos - the crap banks have had it good for a long time - getting away with daylight robbery and lining their pockets.
Oye vey. I’ve dealt with a lost check with HSBC in the past, and I commiserate. What gets me is if you don’t get your payment in on time there’s holy heck to pay, but if the bank makes an error…all of a sudden that’s YOUR fault with no apology or better yet compensation for your trouble. Maybe the current financial crisis is a ‘paid in full’ note from karma?
Yes indeed, what goes around comes around…
had a cheque lost transferring between Lloyds and Alliance and Leicester - both blamed each other, naturally. Took them best part of 5 months to discover they’d inverted the numbers when inputting my national insurance number but I got back my lost interest and compensation. to be honest though, I’d rather they’d just done the job properly in the first place!
Ah the joys of Natwest banking - tried to pay in a RBS cheque with them, didn’t happen to have my paying in book but knew acc number etc and was told I couldn’t do it without the book, useless - still now they’re open on a Saturday too we can have the pleasure of it 6 days a week!
The banks are a criminal cartel. They created this whole problem with speculation on derivatives (things that don’t exist), which the joke of a free press is all but failing to report and now tax payers world wide are footing the bill to prop up these institutions so they can get back to their speculating on thin air. As I’m sure you know here in the US we use a gold standard, which means our paper notes are valuable due to the Federal Reserves (which is not a federal institution) gold reserves. However, the banks use what is called a fractional reserve system, in which they can lend out more than they can guarantee in gold.
If you would like more info check out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractional_reserve
and read some Murray Rothbard.
PS I like your logo and good to see another who’s not taking the guff from this criminal cartel.
You think Natwest is crap? Try banking in Spain mate. The banks in Spain rob you blind with all types of charges, they are slow at doing anything and you get zero customer service out of them. I wish I could bank with Natwest!
Tell you what, it is all a bunch ocrap! I can’t stand it when it happens like Time Tracker said. Worse off, now the banks are in trouble, and the US is ponying up billions to help them, while the individual tax payers are taking it in the shorts! Where is the justice?
I am fed up with NAB’s continuall fee charging and poor customer service so I am going to another bank
I work at fx trading processing and don’t live in the USA. Every now and then I will get checks from US companies for work I have done for them. The Thai bank I uses charges me $10 to deposit the check and the US banks charges me $18 to cash the check. After the fees, you wonder if you even want to get little checks anymore.
Well i personally haven’t had any big time trouble with banks so far. But seems to me you had quite few issues to deal with. Thanks for sharing the info though. need to be careful
There should be no surprise that the banks are interested in making money. I really don’t understand that anyone can be surprised. If the banks didn’t charge enough for their services, they would be flat broke, and end up like the hundreds of “Cheap banks” that have ended in ruin.
Natwest - grrr… don’t get me started on them. Online banking is painful with stupid logins and card readers. Paying your monthlies into your local branch is not worth it; you’ll still get a letter back saying you haven’t paid with all the warnings, etc. Phone them up and you’re instantly a liar, even when you have proof with a slip from them that you paid 2 weeks in advance with a timestamp, date, etc. on it. Make sure they remove that check next to your name saying bad credit - they’re lazy like that. Bad NatWest.
Never been in this sorts of situation. But from now, i will be very much careful. Thanks for sharing this with us. People are gonna be careful of Nat West from now. Keep it up buddy.
I’ve had lots of trouble with banks. Mostly errors due to their system. Sometimes they send me notifications to pay credit card bills when I’ve already paid it. And when I call them they don’t apologize. This is something bankers should look into very seriously.
There are lots of issues in my country too. But because of the competition most of the banks are getting better. I had trouble before but it’s getting lesser and lesser. In the year 2009 upto now I haven’t had a problem yet. I hope it will stay like that.
aron.davison@gmail.com
I have to agree that Nat West bank is crap.
BTW - the pic of the dog cracked me up!
If you want a really crappy bank try banking in Argentina - not sure i found one good bank there!