Down and out: Barclays Bank takes unplanned digital detox, customers not invited Online services with UK-based Barclays Bank have taken a nosedive. As of lunchtime, customers of the bank, whose values include "Excellence" and "Service," were still unable to access online banking or connect via its app. It looks like problems began just before 9am UTC before complaints ramped up. A glimpse at the company's …
... are not surprised.
Barclays wrote to me almost a year ago as their online systems (though not, curiously, their customer service staff) were unable to e-mail me. I'm still waiting for them to fix it and as they removed the option of communicating effectively with them online (there's a chatbot, but that doesn't count as effective) the only way to chivvy them is to write an old-fashioned letter and wait for them to ring me (you can't get through to anyone by phone who might be of any conceivable help).
I also remember on previous occasions where their website has thrown up an error, asking for the error number to be reported to the "support" staff, they had no interest in the error and simply put me through to the telephone banking queue.
Their "service" "excellence" seems to involve incentivizing staff to close whatever problem is raised regardless of whether the issue is actually resolved.
And they only seem to employ staff in branches to point at the machines.
And all the other banks are as bad.
I tried to create a Euro account with them a few years ago, it had to be done in-branch with proof of ID etc. Got there and their computers were down, so had to fill in a long paper form. They then lost the paperwork, found it again some time later and generally went from bungle to blunder. I closed the account as soon as they got round to creating it as they were too late for my needs. They apologised for their incompetence and said they'd give me £20 compensation but I never got a penny.
Can't remember which bank it was (NatWest?) - my wife inherited some money from an elderly relative and we had to go through a whole song and dance with their 'security' team - firstly to prove who we were (acceptable) then they interviewed my wife *alone* to ensure that I wasn't exerting coercive control over her. The whole of the 2nd part of the process made me fell like a criminal *just* because I was a man.
They undoubtedly do get cases of it but their default position was that I wasn't allowed any access because I *might* be exercising coercive control. Afterwards, I wrote then a snotty email, thanking them for successfully making sure to avoid them in future because of the fanatical woman who assumed that I was evil *just* because I was a man.
Then they screwed up the transfer to our (joint) bank account *twice* 0 telling us that the money had been sent (it hadn't) then admitting that their Trust And Safety team was still holding it up.
Never, ever again. I'm usually a fairly peacable sort but they managed to get right under my skin.
That's bad to hear and you should be careful from them. However, as we are discussing scams, you should hear about Joaquim Coimbra's 137.4 million euros scam.
Joaquim Coimbra, a former Portuguese high-net-worth individual who declared bankruptcy with debts of 137.4 million euros, the businessman who made a fortune in the pharmaceutical business was a shareholder in the bankrupt BPN and BPP and was part of the PSD bodies, during the country's financial crisis, has found a new foothold in Cape Verde. Teaming up with the Vasconcelos Lopes family, they oversee the pharmaceutical industry in the country via Inpharma.
Many years ago I spotted the trend, and just went with an online-only bank.
My thinking: If they are ONLY online, then being "down" is ultra-ultra-ultra-critical to them. And they would have to provide a way for me to do everything I need entirely online.
That's worked out perfectly for me so far, after having blacklisted every UK high-street bank for not-unreasonable reasons (being laughed at when asking for a mortgage, so I went next door and got one, complete inability to have a secure website for years and expecting some Java plugin nonsense to suffice, and even holding onto a cheque until the VERY, VERY last moment having never done so before, in order to fine me for briefly going overdrawn, etc.)
I couldn't find any UK bank that would give me notifications of every transaction. My Italian friends had it with their bank fo years, in the UK only "above a certain limit", by a text message that could take forever to arrive, etc. Went to an online-only bank, my phone literally pings as I'm tapping my card in shops. Any shop. All shops. Immediately. For all transactions. The best anti-fraud measure you could ever hope to have.
Since moving to an online-only bank, I've literally not had any complaints about them. They bump my savings rates up and tell me instantly, I can set money aside, I can view my card details in the app, I can freeze it if I lost my card, etc. etc. etc. It all just feels 21st century, while the high street banks were still in the 80's.
Hell, I can't even check my mortgage online with the provider, but the banking app checks my credit record and shows it in my account for me. If they offered mortgages at the online-only bank, you can be damn sure I'd be switching.
And they even let me claim my wages a day earlier than everyone else because, as they say, "All banks could do this, they just choose not to". It's been great.
When someone is giving you bad service, move. I did the Current Account Switch Guarantee and I didn't have to do a thing for all my old high-street bank account to come across to the online-only bank, with scheduled payments, etc. as well.
Plus, I'm not paying for surly staff, useless machines, security and the like in a bunch of increasingly-expensive retail locations. It's totally unnecessary.
If you're expecting a return to the good old days of high street banks... it went. Decades ago. Even the better ones have all followed suit. There is no good high-street bank.
Pack up your things, move to an online-only one, and enjoy life again. It took me installing the app and a couple of photos of my documents. That was it.
I would recommend Monzo, personally.
I get an alert on my phone every time I pay for something from my Barclays account (not including standing orders and direct debits). I can't remember when they started doing this, but is has been like this for at least two years I think. It may not work for cheques, but I haven't used one of them for years. I'm not being a Barclay's fan, just a point of information in case anyone is interested.
Lloyds do it to.
Nationwide, on the other hand, can't even show what's coming out of my account the next day (which Lloyds, HSBC and Monzo do - probably others but I don't have experience of them). But they can tell me the total of the next day transactions by SMS if they're going to take me into my overdraft!
I like Monzo but still have that nagging kernel of doubt that stops me making the full switch. I mainly use it for holiday spending.
And all the other banks are as bad
There's a reason why, 40 (ish) years ago I swore I'd never use a bank again (student debt issues and Lloyds going straight from the "we send you a letter to say you are overdrawn" to "we're sending the baliffs to your parents house" with no intervening steps..) and took out an account with the (then) Nationwide Anglia Building Society.
I still have the account today (when we got married, I added my wife as a joint account-holder). I'm more than happy to use their services - my local branch, you can go in and *actually* speak to someone without having to queue for one of the tellers. Often they'll say "you need to see one of the tellers for that" but they are capable and willing to help.
Ditch the banks. All they care about is how much money they can rip off you to give their shareholders.
I missed a payment (my fault), and was charged interest on my credit card balance (the only time in the last decade, on any card). Fair. So I tried to double-check the interest calculation, and could not ever get it to come out with the number they charged me. After repeated phone calls to Barclay, a BBB complaint, and a CFPB complaint, I finally got someone to let slip enough info about how they do interest calculations to mimic it. (Though they never, ever, ever, no matter how many times I asked, would actually provide an example, much less show me the calculations for MY account.) Turns out they did NOT do the "daily balance method" like they say in the statements, which would be daily compounding, but more of an average balance times interest rate, which would be monthly compounding.
I then discovered that Citi offers a card with higher cash-back (the only reason I had a BarclayCard in the first place), and switched.
I haven't been able to use the app in months, they have made the root detection so strict that they don't just try and detect root but also things that people who use root also do. They now check if you have developer options turned on, they scan your app list to see if you have any apps that make them think you might be using root, they scan your files to see if you have any folders or files that root apps use.
Since I can't figure out what is setting it off and I don't want to have to delete all my files and app I guess I will have to keep using my PC to access online banking, oh wait that means I need a pinsentry device, and you have to order those through the app.
I once said to a bank
You are happy for me to use Android x which is 4/5 years out of date and a major risk, but you detect it is not rooted and is therefore fine, but if I upgrade to a later far more secure Cyanogenmod, you will instantly stop the app from running as you think it is a risk.
Please let me get this in writing so when I lose money I can show it is your negligence.
So, it's fat-fingered configuration again, then ?
Because if your website falls over from one day to the next and nothing exterior is to blame, then something interior is to blame.
And the only thing that can be blamed is either network incompetence or update incompetence.
So, how do you wish to seem incompetent today ?
I moved to them from Smile in around 2011/2012.
I qualified for their Premier bank account, which at the time, came with some nice options that actually made it feel like a premier account such as a dedicated phone number that was usually answered within two or three rings by someone who already had your name and details. They were also UK-based.
You had access to a premier counter in branch which was handy when it was busy as you could basically bypass the inevitably rather long queue.
Then COVID lockdown happened and since then they've stripped everything that made them worth being with. If you dare try to call you get locked into a queueing system from hell. I once spent over 90 minutes on hold for their fraud department...their fraud department ffs!
They removed the direct-call to a dedicated team. They removed the dedicated counter, although even before that they were in the habit of telling you that you had to join the queue as they had no one available to spare to see you. They close my local branch every day now at 2pm - earlier on a weekend.
They force you down a chat route in the app and you get connected offshore to people who more often than not have no idea of what you're asking and when challenged go round in loops contradicting themselves, apologising and promising to do better as you are important to them.
When the chip in my debit card failed, I bit the bullet. Funnily enough the switch has just completed today, although I opened the account a couple of weeks ago (I waited to do the switch just to get a feel of things).
I chose Virgin Private banking simply because you get (shock horror!) a bank manager! Someone you are on first name terms with whom you can call to discuss any aspect of your account and even if he (in my case, it's a he) can't help, knows who can and will get them to call you back. And get this - I have his mobile number and can call or WhatsApp if necessary, even at weekends.
I was a bit taken aback to be honest. It feels new and fresh and yet it's just the way it used to be when I first opened my own adult account. Human interaction. Oh and if I want to see him, I can meet for a coffee or arrange to meet him in branch even outside of normal banking hours if needed.
Their app feels a bit less intuitive than the Barclays one but it's functional.
It will be interesting to see how their customer service holds up.
I got a letter to my address for the previous owners about their loan and lack of payments.
after stuggling on their site for an absolute age, I found something that let me send a very small message to them which included their reference number. Their first response was to ask me for my long 16 digit number. I said, I do not know as the person you need to talk to moved out 18 months ago. Next reply: "can you please provide the 16 digit number". Took me 3 goes to get them to stop asking me.
A month later, another one. This time I decided to try to call. Same thing. Eventually I got through to their thick skulls,
1. I do not know the long digit number as I am not the person. 2, why would a barclayloan have a long 16 digit number ? 3. The have not lived here for nearly 20 months now.
Waiting for the next letter in a couple of weeks
A letter arrived to my address but in the name of someone I'd never heard of. As there are so many scams going on I opened the letter and it confirmed they had been accepted for a credit card (at my address). Sensing attempted fraud I tried phoning the bank's fraud dept but they refused to speak to me because I wasn't the person named in the letter. A few days later a credit card arrived (I could feel it in the unopened letter) which I returned to sender. A day or two later a pin number for the card which I also returned to sender. A week or so later a letter arrived expressing confusion as to why the previous mail had been returned.
I wouldn't bother.
In this instance, stamp it "Not at this address" and put it back in a postbox.
The longer they are receiving mail (without this happening) at your address, the greater the chance they're affecting your credit record because the banks will think they still live there along with you.
Any kind of contact is going to reinforce that.
Just mark it not at this address, post it back and keep doing it until they stop.
Whenever I move (and I bought a house last year), I do this with all mail addressed to previous occupants. Otherwise you're just making trouble for yourself. As it is, the guy somehow appeared on my electoral-roll registration form this year and I corrected it (and then received a letter from the council addressed to him, which I returned... that's their "test" to see if he still lives there).
You are opening yourself up to card fraud (like the other post below yours here), credit record merging, etc. if you're not careful - I know, because I've had that at previous addresses, even to the point of debt collection people turning up at the door looking for the previous residents.
If it's not addressed to you, you're not supposed to open it, either.
When companies - including councils, banks, lawyers, etc. - get mail marked "not at this address", they start cancelling the accounts automatically because they are being told it's not an address you live at, and if they have no other address they will shut down the accounts and wait for the owner to contact them. I know because I've seen that happen too! Just a few letters marked "not at this address" is enough to cancel someone's credit card, for instance, and debt collectors actually tend to respect the same (but usually after a more persistent contact campaign at first).
My experience is that it takes a long time for them to stop sending letters to people I have never heard of, students at a similar address etc The posties don't help by delivering letters for another street (but same number) or to my address which is not a block of flats to Flat 14a and the like.
I wish it was enough to get it to stop - been in my house 5 years, still returning banking mail for the previous occupant including cards (I can tell it's banking by searching the return address online) and the banks concerned (Barclays and Lloyds I'm looking at you) don't shut down the accounts, claim they can't and keep sending. I've even told them to look at the Companies House website as she's a director and so it's publicly available.
"If it's not addressed to you, you're not supposed to open it, either."
It's normally illegal but I think suspecting fraud would be classed as 'reasonable excuse'. Having said that companies and the police don't make it easy to report this sort of thing or seem to take it serious.
The Act reads: "A person commits an offence if, intending to act to a person's detriment and without reasonable excuse, he opens a postal packet which he knows or reasonably suspects has been incorrectly delivered to him."
Ha ha. Yes, I do.
I tried to pay in a cheque following the advice given in a letter (Yes!!!! A letter). It didn't work so I reluctantly resorted to the 'Chat'; what a mistake..... Was the 'error' code a clever diversionary tactic? After a long, drawn-out process (I was not going to give up), it transpired that "The paying-in process doesn't work with Android". I was so furiously furious and furious, I raised a customer complaint (another saga) and eventually (I was still not going to give up), to shut me up, they offered me £10 as compensation. We settled for £100 which I thought was a win although I did ask to be compensated at the same rate as their 'Customer Service Director'.
I donated the money to charity.
[For future reference, if you raise a 'customer complaint' they log it and will phone you back....perhaps days later.]
And having a local bank branch, even as part of a multi-bank hub, is going to be important. Digital = Flakey and customer service will soon vanish, leaving nothing but a tenth rate chatbot at the end of a long phone queue. Banking services are a good indication of how all services will be in the future: crap.
In Newcastle, Barclays closed three city centre branches & opened a new branch in the middle of the main (Nothumberland Street) shopping street.
The Market St branch, now a restaurant, had a couple of sandstone plaques about 60 X 60 cm that must have been there for many years, engraved with "Barclays & Co, Bankers" & the like.
I suggested to them that they might fit in well if they were installed in the lobby of the new branch - would show continuity, etc, etc.
They referred my comments to their complaints section, who never made the promised response.
Couple of years ago Halifax cancelled my credit card when I was away from home and when I was due to go on a business trip the day after I returned (loosely justified by some high profile hack that had exposed millions of card details, BA I think).
Spent ages on the phone getting them to promise to send a replacement immediately by overnight courier. Chap on the other end was as helpful as he could be, he asked me a couple of times "are you making a complaint", no I'm not, I just need this sorted, "yes, but ARE you making a complaint", oh ok, I get it, yes, I'm making a complaint, "ok, I'll transfer you to someone who can deal with that for you".
So making a complaint seems to be a euphemism for "please connect me to someone who might possibly be able to solve my problem".
The card took almost a week to arrive... I also got a letter saying that my complaint had been reviewed but not upheld.
Ah, remember now, it was the TicketMaster hack that had apparently leaked my card details, plausible for I did use TM.
The leak was about 9 months previously and there hadn't been any suspect activity on my account but Halifax decided with literally a few days notice that they would cancel and re-issue *all* affected cards.
With decision making like that at the top its little wonder they struggle to achieve basic availability of their core customer facing systems.
Every time they screw me over in some way like this, and it happens from time to time, I swear I'm moving on, but then I remember that I really like my account number (4 zero and 4 non-zero digits), I also really like my mobile number because it contains the same digits as 2^31 with only 2 out of order, jeez, number nerds...
@munnoch
What would you have expected any Bank to do once they have been notified that some of their issued credit cards could be compromised ?
If they gave all customers a few weeks warning of the re-issue, that would give the criminals the time to go wild on the cards before the cards was cancelled, thus more customers being scammed, this is a rule set by the FCA, not the Bank. Any financial institute has to act in the best interest of their customers.
Those "re-issue decision" It is not as clear cut as you think.
As for Ticketmaster, they were compromised by running a 3rd party chatbot running on Ticketmaster website, that was poor decisions by not performing verification of 3rd party software running on Ticketmaster's website, and also Ticketmaster allowing the chatbot to run on the payment page.
My elderly father used to bank with Barclays. When his health deteriorated due to dementia, my brother and I had to apply for Power Of Attorney to handle his financial affairs. We went through the proper channels, got the POA, and assumed we could then begin to handle my dad’s finances. But that wasn’t good enough for Barclays - we had to go through another whole procedure with Barclays themselves – their own POA setup, if you will. Thus began an exercise in frustration I hope never to repeat. We were lucky that there was a branch in the next town, but actually getting to speak to someone in authority was a nightmare. When we eventually did manage to get an appointment with someone who could handle the POA, it took weeks of back-and-forth to get it all sorted, and we faced ineptitude from Barclays at every turn.
When my father passed away a few years later, we arranged for a solicitor to deal with Barclays on our behalf, to transfer his estate and close the account. No way were we going to deal with them ever again.
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