Published on 10 November 2011 in Money, banks, Barclaycard, credit card, online banking
Barclaycard have managed to place so many restrictions on what you can have as a "memorable word" that you can't pick anything memorable
Published on 9 May 2011 in Money, banks, cheques, money
Recently I received a cheque in the post. It was royalties for the two books I've published for the Amazon Kindle.It was all very exciting. And great. And I waved it around a lot and went "Wahoo!". Then I put it down on the table and left it there until I had chance to pay it in.
Published on 23 December 2010 in Money, banks, building societies, money
I confess I didn't quite expect was what came through the post a few days after opening an account with the Principality - a genuine, bona fide building society passbook.
Published on 16 February 2009 in Money, banks, building societies, credit crunch, Halifax, HBOS, money
As an idealistic 19 year old, I'd voted against demutualisation of the Halifax believing - as I do today - that an organisation based on serving its members first, is better than one that puts it's shareholders first.
Published on 5 February 2009 in Internet, banks, internet, online banking, usability
I decided to trawl through the URLs of 17 online banks - a mixture of big and smaller names - to see what URLs they were using for their secure services, and how they varied from the standard domain names...
Published on 2 December 2008 in Money, AA Savings, banks, money
Of course there are the occasional flaws and black marks, and some are heading towards AA Savings from me right now.
Published on 29 November 2008 in Money, banks, credit crunch, Icelandic banking crisis, Icesave, money
So about two months ago, a substantial amount of my money ended up stuck in the British operation of a failed Icelandic bank, known in the UK as Icesave. Well after a bit of a wait - and nowhere near as long as most people originally expected - my cash has now been returned.
Published on 12 November 2008 in Money, banks, credit crunch, Icelandic banking crisis, ING Direct, Kaupthing Edge, money
Seems the whole Kaupthing Edge clean up continues. It’s taken them some time, but it finally came – the email that says “Yes, it may look like you opened a fixed term savings account, but you didn’t. Sorry.” It appears that whilst the Kaupthing Edge accounts were transferred to ING Direct, the actual physical infrastructure of the online banking system didn’t – it was kept by Kaupthing Edge’s parent, Kaupthing Singer & Friedlander. Technically opening a new account via the online banking system was therefore opening a new account with Kaupthing Singer & Friedlander, who are in administration and therefore can’t accept new deposits. Apparently the money, when they get round to closing the account, will be deemed “never to have moved in the first place”. Presumably I’m not the only person to have tried this little game but it provides a lesson for failed banks (or at least the people trying to run failed banks) – lock off what you can, as soon as you can, even if it’s a crowbar approach. Cos if you don’t, someone may expect something to be possible that’s not, and you’ll waste more time sorting out the mess. One failed bank did do... View Article
Published on 10 November 2008 in Money, banks, credit crunch, Icelandic banking crisis, ING Direct, Kaupthing Edge, money
It's not so long ago that I wrote about failed bank Kaupthing Edge, and the fact that it's new owners hadn't reduced interest rates, nor removed its high paying fixed term rates for existing customers. It seems they've finally caught up on that front...
Published on 31 October 2008 in Money, banks, credit crunch, Icelandic banking crisis, ING Direct, Kaupthing Edge, money
The recent banking crisis has caused me a few issues here and there.