Problems with Nationwide Isas?

We have been contacted by a saver who has had difficulty transferring several cash Isas to Nationwide building society.

In her case the transfer has been dragging on for two months and the money has still not arrived in Nationwide's coffers, even though she initiated the transfer by filling in the relevant forms at her local Nationwide branch.

We would be interested to know if this is an isolated case or whether other people have experienced similar problems in transferring cash Isas to Nationwide.

Comments

[rob mcmahon]

I had a problem with Nationwide. When my ISA term expired they sent me the paperwork to reinvest my funds, which I promptly completed and filed. After I returned the form I was told 2 weeks later that my chosen fund was no longer available and that an isa with a lower interext rate could be substituted

[G Evans]

My wife's transfer of her £11,000 cash ISA from Newcastle B/S to Lloyds TSB was started in April 2008 and the funds finally arrived in November 2008. After much badgering, Newcastle agreed compensation for lost interest and costs incurred in communicating with them and the cheque arrived promptly within a week of the agreement.

[Linda Morgan]

Mine is much the same as most others.
I opened a new ISA a/c with Halifax and the cheque has been posted to them from Nationwide a month ago, at least I had a letter to that affect?? BUT its still not been 'sorted' by Halifax. I feel my money is in no mans land and its very stressful........

[Mrs. D. Styles]

on the 26th of June I filled 2 forms at my local Nationwide branch for transfer of my toisa with intelligent finance & 1 form for transfer for my ISA with Cheltenham & Glos. I have no idea what is happening to my money, Nationwide keeps telling me the demand is so great & they have a backlog,I think its totally unexceptable!

[les bates]

Ditto all of the above. My wife and I began our transfers to Nationwide on 28th April. Bradford and Bingley dragged their heels (paying only the basic Isa interest rate of course)and finally sent their cheque to Nationwide on 17th June.
Nationwide have not responded since nor will they deal with my e-mails. Our £6,000 has just disappeared.

[gsf@monabri.plus.com]

Never mind transferring ISAs - I cannot open up a NW ISA for this year using money that is already in my NW flex account !! A straight- forward NW account to NW account transfer. The issue started in June and won't be addressed until September !

[Pat Semken]

On April !5th, my son (an existing Nationwide customer) applied to transfer his ISA from B&B to Nationwide.
It took Nationwide two weeks to initiate the process and B&B a further six weeks to send the funds to Nationwide (6th June).
As of today (6th August) Nationwide have still not set up the account. APPALLING SERVICE!

[Brian Callaghan]

It took over 3 month for Nationwide to compleate my isa transfer but to fair to them they did backdate the starting date of the isa to the date of the transfer from my original bank.
My wifes tranfer to nationwide only took 1 month,funny old world is'nt it.

[Frank Spencer]

Government should force all isa providers to maintain their existing (previous years) isa accounts at or better than the current tax year's isa offering interest rates.

Also if an institution offers isa's they must also offer transfer in isas unlike now and the transfer should be down by internet banking same day next day or 3 days max and not by post 30+ days later!

[Loyal Customer]

Notwithstanding the fact that only 11 of the 17 entries on this Nationwide thread actually appear to relate to the Nationwide, I can’t follow the logic of those who want to transfer their ISA’s TO them, when there have long been better rates elsewhere.

My beef is that Nationwide have now held on to my ISA funds for well over two months while I wait for a transfer to Abbey. Letters go unanswered; branch staff have been unable to help until recently, despite the Instant Access ISA being a branch based account. Being an experienced ‘rate tart’, I know that these things always get sorted in the end, and that the Nationwide usually honour their promises - unlike some other High Street institutions.

[Jane Kyme]

I opened a Fixed Rate ISA Bond on April 15th for my mother by transfer from Chelsea B/S. I am still waiting for the funds to appear in Nationwide B/S although the previous ISA was closed on June 11th. 3 months and counting, is this a record? My husband and I have had numerous problems with other financial institutions regarding ISAs. Why is there not a greater outcry about this disgusting behaviour?

[S Fogg]

Both my husband and I opened(?) Fixed rate ISAs with the full years allowances at the Nationwide on 14th April this year. We were informed that these would attract interest from this date and when last years ISAs were transferred from B & B they would be added to the Fixed Rate ISA. We were advised that there was a 30 day period allowed for this.

According to correspondence received the ISA transfer request was not made until 2 weeks later. When I enquired in person at NW I was informed that the ISA would not be opened anyway until the transfer was made. The person I spoke to was totally uninterested in trying to help me. B & B informed us on 2nd June that cheques had been sent to NW. 10 days later the ISA had still not been opened.

On the 23rd June I complained to NW in writing but all I received was a reply stating that I would hear from them by 23rd July. I have been totally unable to speak to anyone on the telephone - always engaged and have given up trying. Today(13th July) I see that one cheque has been cashed.

Having decided on NW this year because they would accept transfers in we are regretting our decision and will not bother with them next year.

[Ron]

Cash ISA transfer from Investec to Nationwide ISA Bond. Receipt of Investec cheque dated 11th. April 2008 acknowledged by Nationwide on the 14th.May following numerous lengthy telephone calls by me & a letter to the CE. A month later I received a letter from Nationwide saying the Investec cheque is lost but that they were trying to rectify the situation straight away.
Needless to say the Account is still not opened & a second letter to the CE remains unanswered.However, on 9th. July I did receive a letter thanking me for my application to transfer my ISA account(4 months after a previous acknowledgement) but notifying me that Nationwide were experiencing delays in processing applications due to unprecedented demand. That letter confirmed that Nationwide is committed to providing first-rate customer service!!
What a shambles.

[Judith Hill]

We began the process to transfer a Cheltenham and Gloucester BS Isa worth about £8K to Nationwide in early March 2008. It was to be added to an ISA already held at Nationwide. At the end of April tried to contact Electra who deal with the transfers but they don't answer the phone. Enquired at local branch - who knew nothing despite the relevant transfer form having been completed. They told me it took time. Some weeks later they said they had not received the cheque from C&G so had the cheque cancelled and started again. After some weeks made more enquiries - NW said we needed to fill another form in. It was completed and posted and lost. This has happened twice. On Wednesday of last week - 9th July went into branch and completed a third form. Still waiting and they say they have a backlog. Would complain but the complaints procedure is so long drawn out it would probably take us into next year. Would withdraw money but then would lose tax free status! The manager in the local branch said he would try to get to the bottom of it. I'm not hopeful.

[Peter Landshoff]

Bradford and Bingley received my application to transfer to it an HSBC ISA on 7 April. It has still not been done.

[Keith Thomas]

I completed a transfer form at my local Nationwide branch on April 17th to transfer my N.S.& I. Cash Isa. 60 days later after enquiring, I was told that all transfers are completed within 30 days! It is now nearly 3 months later and in response to a letter from me, Nationwide states that I should not worry as all interest will be backdated to either the day the application was received or when the cash transfer is received - whichever is the LATER...! It is completely outrageous as still nothing has happened. My wife transferred her N.S.& I ISA to Britannia at the same time and it all went through in 14 days. What is the matter with Nationwide?

[Ann]

I completed 2 application forms to transfer my ISAs from Kent Reliance BS and NS&I. Kent Reliance went through fine. NS&I took over 2 months. I had to complete a 2nd application but still did not get processed. All the staff I spoke to were absolutely hopeless. I wrote 2-3 letters. Eventually, I took it higher and spoke to a manager. He was great and sorted it in no time. I had threatened to remove all my money out of Nationwide. Whether I would have followed through my threat is another thing but it might have worked as I have a lot with them.

[Francis O'Keeffe]

I handed in my application at the local Nationwide branch on April 5th and I am still waiting to hear. This despite writing and phoning and emailing.

What I dread is that the Fixed rate Isa will be withdrawn just before the transfer finally goes through so the whole exercise will then be a waste of time.

francis

[John]

I won't go into the details (although it's outlined on a thread on the MSE website). It is nearly five months since I applied to transfer my ISA from another provider. I received the certificate last week but without the interest that was due from February to April. When I phoned them they said this would take up to another 28 days to correct.

I feel I am in a good position to comment as I have spoken to their various staff so many times. one problem is that their staff clearly don't know what they're doing. I could give lots of examples but one example is being sent an incorrect form to complete. When I queried this they said I should complete it anyway. Sure enough, four weeks later, they admitted it was the wrong form and suggested I collect a correct one from a branch. But they don't hold these forms in branch... I could go on. They are useless. I'm assuming it is lack of training.

[Andy]

My mother has been waiting for over 3 months to transfer her Nationwide ISA to Lloyds TSB. Lloyds said that it would be done by mid June. Mid June arrived, they then said they hadn`t recieved the cheque. Both banks were contacted by my mother, but they didn`t seem to helpful, or quick to sort the matter. Apparently, Nationwide have finally issued another cheque. Surely an ISA transfer should be a routine, quick and simple operation for the major banks. If they can`t get this right, then is it no wonder they`ve lost so much money through investing in dodgy credit deals ? I worry when I hear politicians telling us that the UK has a world leading financial service sector.

[JEC Tasker]

NS&I transferred one of my ISAs very quickly, within 14 days. But B&B took 52 days! When applying for an 08/09 eISA with Birmingham Midshires,it took them 9 weeks to confirm it, totally ignoring 2 letters and 3 emails from me requesting a response. A real black hole. With both B&B and BM a final letter to the MD (or eqivalent) elicited an immediate phone call and some action! Are we surprised the banks are in their current parlous state when they cannot manage even straight forward tasks?

[D Garforth]

I have now been waiting over 4 weeks for my ISAs with Barclays to be transferred to Nationwide.In spite of filling in a form at the Nationwide a week before my wife,it took Nationwide 2 weeks longer to notify me they were dealing with the transfer.Can anyone tell me what is going on?

[K Neale]

My wife and I opened E-ISAs in Aug 2007. Due the delays and problems that we encountered, including the issue of confusing statements, we sought and were offered payments for lost interest in Nov 2007. We are still waiting to receive the payments and a response to our letters of complaints on this.

[Susan James]

I decided a year or so ago to transfer my Bradford & Bingley branch based ISA to an eISA, also with Bradford and Bingley. It took several weeks, and that was within the same organisation! No explanation was ever given. Is this a problem with ISAs only or are other savings accounts similarly problematic, I wonder?

[Charles]

I've been waiting for almost a month now for an ISA transfer from HSBC to Abbey. I spoke to Abbey after 3 weeks and they told me they've experiencing similar problems with HSBC for some time now and to get in touch with them next week. I hope this doesn't drag on any longer as HSBC told me initially it should take no more than 10 working days to complete!

[Peter R Copeland]

I can't comment directly concerning Nationwide but I have experienced similar foot-dragging in transferring several matured ISA's from A & Leics. into Halifax. Although I have received confirmation from Halifax that they await the transfered funds. A & Leics. seem to be rather reluctant to release in spite of maturity occuring several weeks ago.

[james]

I visited my local Nationwide branch, filled in the forms, etc. The transfer was still not made after 4 weeks so I faxed Nationwide and got a letter saying they acknowledge my transfer form and will take action. About 3 weeks later, my "old" ISA account was closed and letter sent to me saying funds will be transferred. Another 2 weeks and still no sign from Nationwide that funds have been received so I rang Nationwide who said it could take another 6-8 weeks for receipt !! I then received a letter from my "old" ISA Bank which stated that funds will be transferred to ANOTHER HIGH STREET BANK which I have an account with !! The funds are then credited to that bank and not Nationwide.

I'm too fed up with Natiowide to bother so I'm leaving it at that other bank.
jamesdell10@hotmail.com