The continuing saga of the milkman's cheque. I managed to get them £10 to cancel the cheque as that was all I had in my savings account with them. Guess what? They have let the cheque go through and charged me another £25 for doing so. This has left me £67 overdrawn and they are now going to charge me £5 per day for every day it is overdrawn. I don't think so.

When I phoned about my card details being stolen, the woman from customer services put a stop on the card, then put me on to security about sending out a fraud form, which I still have not received. I asked him how I was supposed to get money out without a card and he put me back to customer services, who very abruptly wanted to know why I hadn't come through with my security details. Well, I did, didn't I? Then I get a letter from them telling me off for not using my security details!

I am not putting another penny into that bank, and they can whistle for their bank charges.

No, I do't have a mortgage with them just my current account. What I meant was, I transferred the money into my current account to pay the seller's solicitors for the house I was buying. This always has to be paid by CHAPS, but Alliance and Leicester could not do that by phone as they had not had my home phone number long enough, because it was a short term rent.

I have always made a point of never having a mortgage or anything else in the same place as my current account. I will be in a position to tell them where to shove it once I get another account set up.

so you currently have a mortgage with alliance and leicester right?

If you still have a current deal with alliance and leicester then unfortunantely you will have to stay with them until your early repayment charge or early redemption fee ends or if you want to change mortgage provider then you will have to risk paying these fees, in order to change provider.

If your deal is finished and you find yourself on the standard variable rate then it maybe worth your while looking for a new deal and getting away from A & L.

Alliance and Leicester have alot of things to learn in order to start gaining new customers and keeping the ones they have already got, and I think the Santander Group should be ashamed at their shoddy customer service.

Sorry, I meant to say CHAPS, not BACS. I get them muddled up!

It is too late to ask milkman not to present the cheque, as he had already been and gone before I got this information and he pays in on Fridays. It was a bad credit bank account and I was lucky to get a debit card instead of a cash withdrawal card. I asked if they could give me just £100 overdraft for a week, until I get paid on Friday, but no, they couldn't do that either.

I was not happy with them last year when I was buying another house. We had been in rented for four months and as you know, the deposit for a house has to be paid by BACS. They couldn't do that over the phone, as they had not had my home phone number for long enough and a mobile number was no good. I had to traipse all the way to the branch with ID to prove it was me, and when I finally got there, they didn't know what I was talking about. They had to phone in themselves to find out and confirm that it was me.

I am changing to Think banking, as, although they charge £12.50 per month to manage your regular payments, they do not charge if any have to go back. I wanted, though, to keep my mortgage completely separate so I was going to leave that with the Alliance & Leicester, as I have some extra money with goes in every month to cover it. Now I am uncertain as to the best way to proceed, as I would like to tell them to shove it, but I do need a debit card.

I think a high street bank would have been a bit more helpful under the circumstances.

typical alliance and leicester!

why dont you give the milkman a ring and tell him the situation, and tell him not to present the cheque for payment.

Alliance and Leicester should be trying to help you more and they do have an overdraft facility which they should make available to you.

Ive had lots of problems so far with alliance and leicester, but so far have found threats and rudeness to be the best method of dealing with these idiots. Dont get me wrong I prefer not to have raised blood pressure! but have found the tactful understanding way not to work with them so that leaves you with no alternative than to get angry.

I think the Santander Group who took this shoddy bank over should take a serious look at the way in which their A & L staff deal with things. As I already bank with Abbey (part of the santander group), and have alot of savings with them, I dont think they would be to pleased if I closed my account and went to some one completely different like 1st direct. After all, it isnt just alliance and leicester now who I deal with, its the santander group and Im not happy with the crap Ive had with them.

Ive prepared my letter and charges which where charged to me because of A & L s mistakes and am sending it special delivery for A & L to look at, and hopefully, they will honour the charges and close this account for me and that should be the end of any business I will ever do with A & L.

hope you get your problem sorted soon

I have been with Alliance and leicester for just over a year as I needed an account when I fell out with barclays and have a bad credit record. At first I thought it was good as I had internet banking, a debit card and a cheque book. Being as I was paid cash on a daily basis, it was handy to be able to go into the local little post office, pay it in, and know that it was going in instantly.

Having only just started in a new job and being desperately short of money, I only had my small widows pension to last till I get paid next Friday. This was due in today, so I went into my online banking to make sure it had gone in. You can imagine my shock to find the account almost empty, even though the pension had gone through. There was one direct debit which I expected to come out, but as to the rest of it? I phoned immediately and was told that I had purchased foreign currency with my card. As this was 8 am and as soon as I got up, someone must have been up and at things very early.

So my card had been compromised, I had no money at all. They put a stop on my card, good, but I had already written out a cheque for the milkman for £60. I asked them if they could cancel it. No, they said, because I don't have £10 in the account to pay the cancellation fee. So, they would not let it go £10 overdrawn to cancel the cheque, but they would let it go £25 overdrawn to send the cheque back when it was presented.

Are you with me so far? They could not waive the fee as it was not my fault that the money was not there. As you all know, in order to pay money into this account, you need your debit card at the post office or branch, which card had been stopped. So I asked how I could pay the money in to cover the cheque, if I managed to borrow some. Yes, I can do that with a deposit slip, but it will take four days unless I go to a branch. The nearest branch to me is 12 miles away, parking a good twenty minutes from the branch, and it is Friday. After work, it would be past closing time before I could get anywhere near the place.

Now I have to wait for a form to sign, a new debit card, and for them to investigate the fraud before I can get my money back. they have been disgustingly unhelpful and were extremely rude when I did not know the exact amount of the milkman's cheque. I write out so few cheques that I know roughly what they are.

I have already arranged for my money to go into a new account and I shall be telling Alliance and Leicester exactly where to go.

thanks for the advice re complaining to alliance and leicester - I'm not confident about getting any kind of resolution now though. I've just closed my account after a catalogue of f*** ups including taking two months to replace my debit card. Now I've discovered they have charged me £5 per day since my account was closed because I hadn't cancelled a £200 standing order to an alliance and leicester ISA I had also closed that came out the following day! what annoys me is that they phone you constantly trying to get you signed up to something but dont bother telling you about o/d charges on an account I thought was closed....

hi all,

have now been charged another £10 by my car insurance company KwikFit for the bounced direct debit, bringing my total charges for Alliance and Leicesters mistakes to over £50.

I have sent KwikFit an email to ask them to reconsider this charge because of A & L's inability to switch my account properly and I will let you all know in due course what happens with A & L's response to all of the charges I have incurred because of their errors, including whether KwikFit Insurance Services will still apply this charge to my policy.

Fingers crossed.

Hi there

To anyone who submits a complaint to a bank/building society and doesn't get any joy, refer to the Banking Code Standards. That outlines what codes the banking sector should adhere to (although it is voluntary, I'm under the impression it will become compulsory). It gives advice to the general public on what they can do if they have a grievance. I've a feeling a bank/BS has 7 or 14 days to respond the complaint then another set period of time to bring to resolution (sorry can't remember what). I would also threaten them with going to the financial ombudsmanif they don't resolve to your satisfaction.

If I'm sending a letter of complaint to anywhere I always send by special delivery, not recorded. By using Special, it may cost more but you can track it down to the time it was delivered, as it has to be signed for, and also can get a copy of the signature of the person who signed for it. You can get a copy of the signature for proof of delivery if you ever have to take things down a legal route.

I would say to anyone who has to go through the hassle of complaining to the likes of A&L, never back down! Bombard them with phone calls (if you can get through) / emails / letters etc. until you can get it resolved. I do it and get results!

Good luck!

Snowqueen

Hi to all the A & L disgruntled people,

I have visited 1 of A & Ls branches and asked to see a supervisor to discuss their mistakes, the lady who didnt introduce herself as a supervisor, did however sit me down and discussed with me all the problems I had experienced with the online switching service, she rang through to the switching team for me and discussed with them, what basically I had already spoke to them about anyway and informed me that she could not close this account for me at the branch and that I would need to speak to their "security" team (weird) by ringing them up. Also If I had incurred any penalty fees from my direct debits that I should send a copy of the fees to their "customer service complaints section" for them to decide if they will pay for their mistakes.

I rang up their "security team" and they told me I needed to go into the branch to close this account lmfao.

I told them I've already been into the branch to try and close this account, but they told me to ring you......no no no he said, they shouldnt have told you that.....ffs like I give a *** mate I just want to close the *** account arghhhhhh.

Anyway now I have to send them a letter telling them I want to close my account and send them copies of my mortgage companys unpaid direct debit fee which then they will decide whether they will pay it or not.

Incidentally to the £30 my mortgage company has charged me it has cost me over £10 in phone calls to switch all of my direct debits back to my old account.

This switch to the Alliance and Leicester has been not only a waste of my time, but has now cost me £40 not including the petrol costs and parking fee just to go and visit their branch, just to be told I have to ring them, in order to close the account.

I will let you all know how I get on with getting some money out of them.

I have also fallen into the no-address/e email contact and complete rub-around on trying to complain about one of these high interest - free travel ins + all the things that would attract someone like myself.
I have tried all normal tactics and have now resorted to writing to every possible contact plus Money Mail, Watchdog etc in the hope that the long over-due phone call from a more senior manager will happen.

I have even written to Santander their senior partner.
I will keep this forum informed of my eventual progress but I think it will a long time - at £5 a day overdraft fee on an account that I have never paid any cash into or registered.
If only the customer complaints department was as helpful as the new customers phone call I made when I first responded to their advert!

I opened an Alliance and Leicester account 12 months ago, luckily I didn't set up transfers of direct debits, however I have had problems with the internet banking. If money is credited or debted to your account it is shown in the total balance on the summary page but the details of the transaction don't show on the statement for at least 24 hours, so you don't know where it has come from or gone to.

There was also a problem with transferring money between accounts, it let me transfer a large sum from current to savings account when I meant to do it the other way around ending up badly in the red. When they charged me the £25 fee for a bounced cheque I telephoned to discuss it and they immediately re-credited my account as a 'guesture of goodwill'.

I am lucky, I use this account for a minimal amount of transactions and kept my other account with another bank (First Direct) for my main use, glad I did now. Although I got 8% interest on the current account for a year I wouldn't say it was worth it.

Lulu61

They will also charge you £25 for every single one of the direct debits they have turned back. Good luck getting that back!

called A & L today at 4.35pm, put on hold until 4.55pm, when I finally got through, although helpful, it seems all the correspondance I should have had was sent to an incorrect address, all the direct debits that they switched are trying to take money out of an account that has no funds in it and consequently sending me letters demanding payments for mortgage etc etc etc. Mortgage company has charged me a fee for bounced direct debits and when I asked what A & L would do about getting the debits reversed they said I would be better off ringing up all the companys myself and sorting the details out......thanks alot A & L, just spent best part of an hour wasting my phone bill over your *** up!!

As for the switching bonus of £100, because I was already with Abbey (Santander) I am not eligible for the bonus PMSL.

So to anyone considering switching to A & L, if your already with a bank owned by Santander then you probably wont get any bonus that A & L offer.

This switch has been a total waste of my time.