Just remembered, I kept phoning and emailing Abbey last year. Every phone call recorded message ended with a flourish about Abbey having won an award for customer service excellence.. you know the sort "And the award for the award - *** I've forgotten the award's name et cet era..

Yeah well I started like that for a bitof dramatic build up. I "filled" out the 6% bond application and they then immediately send you hard copy. Twice i phoned to say I hadn't received it and was told two lots had been sent. By pure luck an email of mine kicked in and a real person said phone me on this direct line. I did and as we were speaking he printed off a third application and actually talked me through the process and how he was putting it in for posting while we were talking - I got it the next day, I never saw the first two and I'm in no doubt that if I hadn't found him I would probably of missed the issue - last of the high rates.

My colleague had a similar problem with Abbey when she changed the date of her standing order for paying her rent, and the Abbey managed to pay the rent to her landlady twice each month for 3 months despite her contacting them and getting it sorted. This also caused her to go overdrawn and they charged her for this too, with other payments then 'bouncing'.

She had dreadful customer service with different answers and people promising to ring back then not.

enough was enough and she opened another account elsewhere and moved on.

She complained to the FOS, but I'm not sure how she did in the end. I think she was claiming £10 per hour of her time (over a day's worth) trying to get this resolved.

Good luck with it.

Sparky.

Dear huckster

Just cut and pasted your thread for future reference.Excellent to see up to £10k or 12 months. i can't help saying wouldn't the world of the consumer be so much better if relevant AND enforceable legislation with these penalties or more applied in so many fields including salesmen in cars, homes, insurance, domestic building, heating etc etc and don't get me started on "Sorry electorate we can't find the "controlling mind" but the PM will be attending a hand wringing photo shoot as we speak...

Abbey have an unfortunate manner about this. I know of a case where Abbey have written to a former customer threatening to fine them over this - quite how they propose to fine them, I know not, but their customer service is spectaculalry bad over this issue that was entirely of their making...

NW Londoner:

If anyone can advice me on the correct security protocols, and FSA rules when contacting a customer - I'd be grateful so I can log a formal complaint, which I was prevented from doing when I was contacted by Abbey.

The security protocols are mainly under the Data Protection act. They have to ask atleast 3 indentifying questions, to establish that you are the data subject i.e. the account holder. By not doing this the person who phoned you could be subject to a fine I think up to £10,000 or up to 12 months in prison. This is what I remember that the act says could be the potential punishment of an individual breach of data protection rules. So you could make a complaint to Information commissioners office. The following link may help you in regard to the act and details of some enforcements.

http://www.ico.gov.uk/what_we_cover/data_protection/enforcement.aspx

Also the Banking code and FSA rules apply. Links to both below. I think if you phoned the Banking Code standards board which Abbey are members of, they will point you in the right direction.

http://www.bankingcode.org.uk/howdo.htm

http://www.moneymadeclear.fsa.gov.uk/

You could have some fun at Abbeys expense and in compensation for your time and inconvenience you might be able to bag an ex-gratia payment.

Huckster

1 Hopefully you still have the exact time/s of the phone calls on your mobile phone. If so guard these with your life. If you request transcripts from Abbey or do it through a DP Act "SUBJECT ACCESS" request (40 days for them to comply) they will want the exact time/s of the call/s. ALSO big companies sometimes say they only keep this stuff for a short period of time (to short circuit a well meaning member who says they have to keep the info for x years there is one very big communications company who say short time or equiv.

2 Phone up the FSA and ask them directly for procedure/help obviously being familiar with Abbey's complaints procedure. Also pick their brains about who else's brains to pick. SORRY just come back to this what I would is get the DP Act info first then do the complaint.

Having had an Abbey current account for some 21 years, I signed up to use the on-line banking platform some 4 years ago. However in September 2008, an error in the on-line banking platform resulted in each of my bill payments going out twice. Suffice to say, a disgruntled customer - stormed into the bank to try and identify why more than £4K had disappeared from my current account. Within 2 weeks the money was returned and the matter closed.

Clearly this was not the case, as the payments had resulted in credits to my nationwide current account and credit card - unbeknown to me. I wrote to Abbey to try and resolve the situation. However the lady in question Rukshana Begum did not reply. I called the bank and spoke to someone - who never called me up. So I basically gave up.

However 11 months on I receive a phone call from someone called Pizer. This young lady tells me she's calling from Abbey. Now take into account I'm at work and she then asks me if I'll return the 'money' that was credited to my nationwide account. What I found shocking is that there was no security, no checks just simply 'Hello it's Pizer, from Abbey'. This young lady then proceeded to reel of amounts relating to my account and then became quite hostile, informing me I had to return the money. Quite rightly I complained at her tone, lack of customer service and lack of security (after all how did she know I was who she thought I was). None the less I was put on the phone to another gentlemen - who basically wanted to know - will I return the money. Now this has never been an issue, but if you're called on your mobile at work - by a hostile person - demanding you return money - that went missing some 11 months ago, you'd be somewhat suspicious. I'm not sure what the FSA rules are and clearly there must be some code of conduct. I did try and log a complaint about the 'manner in which I was spoken to' as well as the 'flippant' and 'derogatory tone' used. Clearly I've agreed to return the money (as is only fair) - but I'm very disappointed with Abbey National - in what has been a catalogue of errors of the last few years, and a real decline in customer service.

If anyone can advice me on the correct security protocols, and FSA rules when contacting a customer - I'd be grateful so I can log a formal complaint, which I was prevented from doing when I was contacted by Abbey.

Not impressed.

BM