Barclays morgage gone wrong £6700 missing

[zemo86]

I think it will be easier if submit my letter rather than explaining from the start and re-typing my incident. I am sure some of you could use this letter or partial of it... it is quite entertaining!!.

This was my first letter to them, I have since sent 5x more via email and post, we have had made over 25 phone calls and 6x visits to the branches. I have also copied the FOM in on this too. They put my money back into my account last week and back dated the interest.

 

I am not a happier customer and wish to take this matter to court, could someone help me and advise on what to do. Barclays offered me £100 compensation and I told the this simply not good enough, myself and wife are working professionals and we calculated £600-800 in man hours lost tracing and chaing money lost by Barclays!

 

When get a chance I shall list all the points were Barclays have breeched and failed. This has been a major C**k up on their behalf and this will have happened to every one who makes a payment over the counter towards their Woolwich tracker morgage.

 

 

WITHOUT PREJUDICE

I am writing to complain about funds going missing from my account. I am infuriated as £6700 has gone missing and not been put into my mortgage account as I requested.

This is now the 3rd time Barclays have messed this up. I really can not contemplate why such a simple transaction can go wrong. You are meant to be a leading BANK and these school boy mistakes are simply not acceptable and should be seen as an embarrassment to your organisation.

On the 11th September I paid in £2700 cash into my tracker mortgage account at the Narborough Road branch. I rung up the following week and was told there was no evidence of this transaction and it usually takes 4 days to clear. On the 18th September I paid in a further £4000 at the town centre branch and asked for my balance which was still unchanged and the £2700 I paid in on the 11th had still not gone in.

Today (6th Oct) I rung the mortgage helpline for advice on my Tracker mortgage, the adviser on the phone was clueless about the mortgage I held, I then simply asked for a balance update and to see if the payments had cleared. He then advised me there is no evidence of the above payments and that I should contact my branch. I had spent over half an hour on the phone.

At this point I was fuming and went straight to the local branch near my workplace (where I wasted more of my employers time) at which point I was then told without a receipt I could do nothing, obviously this fumed me even further and then Nikki(cashier) decided to ring the branch at Narborough Road to check. Surprise-surprise the money arrived at the bank but has now disappeared. The clerk was not helpful and tried her best to fob me off, behind me stood 10 or so of your customers listening to my complaint and a clerk whom clearly did not want to help. She didn’t bother ringing the town centre branch and logged a complaint which will be responded to at some point within 8 weeks (so will my money be earning interest for you at my expense in the meantime?).

I did not go to the branch to waste my time complaining, I simply wanted to know where my money was. I can not tell you how infuriated I am, I am at the end of my tether with this incompetent bank. £6,700 of my hard earned money has disappeared and no one is willing to help or give me a straight answer. What sort of a bank service are you running?? You have quite happily taken my money but have not managed to fulfil your side of what I thought was a simple debit/credit transaction.

On both occasions I wanted to transfer the money in September from my Natwest account but was told it was not possible, so I had to get cash withdrawn from Natwest to give to your bank. If your staff can not handle cash transactions then let me know and I shall start banking elsewhere.

In fact I was planning on moving my banking and all my savings from Natwest to Barclays but I think after this fiasco I will stay with Natwest who seem like the safer option as Barclays have so far demonstrated that they are incapable of handling my money.

Previously in May 2009 the same incident occurred and the money was transferred to my current account in error. I specifically asked to speak to the branch manager to get this right as the clerk was unsure. This seems to be a concurrent problem as it is the 3rd time at 3 different branches and now it is seriously beyond a joke. Again this took over 5weeks to resolve which is somewhat unrealistic as it should have been a simple transaction. This only makes me wonder where my monthly payments are being assigned – have they actually hit my account balance or are they just stuck somewhere in the system in the hope that unsuspecting customers won’t even notice?? Just to point out that I hold a reducing balance tracker mortgage where one of the benefits is that interest is calculated daily on the balance – how can this be possible if monies are not being allocated accurately? I do not wish to pay interest on money I do not owe.

I seriously can not stress to you how annoyed I am, I don’t think anyone has ever got me worked up as much as Barclays have.

To top it off, all I simply wanted to do was to trace the Woolwich rate. I have a tracker mortgage which allows me to choose other products, I used to be able to go directly to the Woolwich website and track the best rate (one of your selling points when I initially took up the mortgage) but this facility has now been removed and I can no longer track the rates without going to the branches and speaking to specialist mortgage advisors. These mortgage advisors are never available unless you make an appointment and this applies to the main branch in Leicester too. The website is very disappointing as it is only tailored for new custom. The existing customers have been pushed aside and are at the bottom end of the priority list.

You have caused me undue stress and inconvenience, this has been a bitter experience for me and I am extremely disappointed with the level of understanding from all staff members involved.

I do not want an apology letter again. I want to know the reason why these mistakes keep occurring and I need you to give me reasons why I should continue banking with you. If this level of service was given to you would you continue banking with Barclays?

I want you to compensate me for this episode and provide me 0% interest (plus BBR currently 0.5%) on my mortgage account for 1 year and also guarantee a better level of service in writing. I automatically expect all my interest charges to be back dated.

I will be seeking legal advice and contacting The Financial Ombudsman Service. I want this matter dealt with extreme urgency and with the highest authority. Don’t make me wait 40days to find out where my money went.

Also I have requested mortgage updates and statements on numerous occasions but still nothing has arrived, no surprises there. If it isn’t too much to request, could someone within your giant organisation please print off my current mortgage status along with all the payments I have made and post it to me? I was told my mortgage would be reviewed in September where my monthly payments would be changed to reflect current interest rates and a new statement of account would be issued. It is now 6th October and again nothing has arrived, I won’t hold my breath.

Please remember if the shoe was on the other foot and I had missed a payment, I am more than certain your organisation would not hesitate to penalise me, so please be assured that I will not let this matter rest until I am satisfied with your response.

Tomorrow I shall be seeking further advice regarding this matter.

Copies of both my deposits made in September are attached.

I anticipate your speedy reply; let’s just hope this is not in 8weeks time.

[BankFodder]

Don't use without prejudice if you don't know what it means.

 

Also, I can appreciate that you are angry but letters like this are verbose and don't get the job done.

 

You are asking for some unrealistic remedies here - 0% interest etc. Only seek what is obtainable - otherwise you will feel more frustrated and more angry. The trick is to set goals that you can win.

 

Frankly I think that this is one for the FOS

[zemo86]

I know, I guess I just wrote this in anger and let my emotions take over.

 

I have logged this complaint with the FOS last month and that point they told me to give Barclays an opportunity to sort it out, I spoke to them again today and was advised to wait for their full and final offer in writting and then they will take the matter further on my behalf. He has also advised the compensation is no where near the amount they should be offering me.

 

What makes it worse is that if I had lost my receipts Barclays state I wouldn't have a leg to stand stand on...(no apparent proof of deposit anywhere!!!) I thought I was dealing with a proffesional bank obviously NOT.

 

I'm sure we all would be pi***d as much as I was when finding that Baclays are capable and able to lose a total of £11,000 at three seperate branches. To make it even worse its the actual process they have in place which is not correct so any customer paying via cash or cheque will experience the same problems as myself.

 

I will await for their offer letter and keep you updated.

 

When I get some compo I will donate to this site gladly!!

 

Take care

[slick132]

Hi Zemo,

 

If you have already involved the FOS, you'll have to wait for them to come back to you after they've had the necessary replies from Barclays. Trouble is, they give the bank up to 8 weeks to repond so it may be some time being resolved.

 

Just be gratefull the money has already shown up, so you only have to deal with the issue of compensation.

 

Be realistic in what you want in compensation - a good starting point would be to calculate the likely effect on these deposits reaching your a/c.

 

Then you can make sure they cover your loss and offer something on top for your time and stress.