Alliance & Leicester Business Bank Account

We've had a lifetime free business account with Alliance and Leicester for several years. It's now of course owned by Santander. Our main problem is the lack of detail that is shown with regard to incoming payments. We usually receive a paper backup of transactions that show 'transaction details' but these details are completely lacking when payments are viewed online. Instead, each payment shows only the name and part of the address of the sender. This is not much use of the sender is making payment on behalf of a client - something that happens quite often in our case. Furthermore, any payments sent by 'faster payments' do not generate any paperwork at all, so if we receive a payment for example from 'Western Union' we are left completely in the dark as to who sent it. We've been talking to Santander about this for weeks but without any resolution. Personally, I think Santander would probably like to be rid of this 'lifetime free account' and is doing what it can to drive customers away.

No customer service whatsoever.

Online works ok, so was just about worth it when 'Free for Life', but now they have decided to go back on their word on this and charge fees I suggest everyone should stay well clear

Go elsewhere

Where do you begin? Life is just too short. Go elsewhere.

With the change to Santander I received a new debit card with my name wrong. Not spectacularly wrong - just a bit wrong. I rang up (8th May) and was told that they'ld send a new one. Today, 1st June, I have no new card and my old one has expired. So I ring up again. It appears that my new card with my correct name wasn't ordered (the reason my name had been changed was due to names on new cards - following the changeover - all being MANUALLY re-entered!!!); in any event I now apparently should have been sent a new PIN number which I haven't received.

I now have one old card and one new card. Neither work and I am told that I should receive my re-ordered PIN by 18TH JUNE!

Don't bother coming round my house for 18 days - I have no food to give you.

I have had so many problems after A&L got taken over. Their customer service is non existent. They block off my internet access whenever they please especially when I transfer a larger than usual amount. Then to try and activate the account again, they ask you questions which are to do with transactions that may have taken place in the last 7 days. How the hell can you know these transactions when they have blocked off your website access,,, with a silly message that says "Due to planned maintenance...."

The Alliance & Leicester business banking web service is pretty good but thats where it ends. They don't appear to have any concept of customer service. Staff are rude and/or unhelpful on the phone. You can use secure email via the website, but in my experience, if the problem is too hard for them (like "when will my account be closed?") they ignore the message or respond with something irrelevant. I spent 3 weeks monitoring my account and asking them when it would be closed - they couldn't tell me. Why? Despite having received all the details including my address (requested via unsecure email) they couldn't find it on their system and then proceeded to ask me for my date of birth (again via unsecure email). For anyone that has had any experience with systems or security, this is incredible and very very scary. Complaints are just bounced back to Customer Service. Seriously, don't go near them.

This bank should be shut down and not allowed to operate, I am sure they will loose ALL customers and be out of business soon so move to another bank while you can! Made an international payment online and noticed they charged me more than the agreed GBP equivalent stated online, I called the international payments team at 9am to be told they are extra fees (£86) on top of the £25 transfer fee! I asked the lady to look at my online banking to see the GBP equivalent amount that should have been debited and she said'I have not got time, its fees and thats it'' then hung the phone up on me!!! After ringing around many different deparments for 4 hours and being told many different things I finaly got to a manager from customer service and the internet banking team, they looked at it (thank god as its hell to get someones to take time to look) and noticed I have been over charged and clearly could see what they debited from my account was more than the agreed GBP equivalent, they said they did NOT know why I have been charged extra and say an investigation has been launched and it is a high priority case, now I have noticed 3 other international payments that have the same issue! They say the investigation will take around 5 days and they need to find out why and how this has happened, they say I should get a refund and possible compensation (im just hoping for a call back and a refund). I can only think of 1 thing DAY LIGHT ROBBERY!!!!!!! check your bank statements! another thing I noticed is the £25 fee they took as the first fee is over charged also! on there website it states a low fixed transfer fee of £16.00!!!!!!

http://www.alliance-leicester.co.uk/SiteInfo/international-payments.aspx

Some of the reviews on here are frankly quite ridiculous; 'closed for inactivity after 18 months' and 'they charge you £5 if you don't pay in £1000 in any month'. These are meant to be reviews of a business current account - be realistic.

I opened our business account about 4 years ago and use it as such. It's a small business account and completely free. A couple of times in the first few months of opening I had to pay the £5 charge for not paying in £1000 that month, but that was clearly stated in the T's and C's and list of charges so wasn't a surprise. Once I moved all my work over to the Limited company for which the account is operating I haven't had that issue. I would suggest if you're not paying in at least £1000 a month on a regular basis there isn't much point or requirement for a business bank account.

When I have called the customer service team they have always answered promptly and politely resolved my query. A couple of times a Chaps payment out has taken 2 days rather than the same day, but both times I have had the fee refunded. I like the internet banking site, you can do pretty much anything you need to on it.

Couple of frustrations. Paying in cheques means a trip to a specific branch which has a cheque scanner machine (I don't like to post them) and they won't take business account cheques over the counter which I find frustrating when the ATM is out of order. The faster payments limit should be higher by now. Fair enough £250 for a test period, but it's been like that for nearly two years now and it's time for a review and increase of the maximum amount that can be transferred this way.

For a free business bank account with all the facilities that any small business could want I would recommend this account. You get paid a little interest on any cash in the current account and I can move funds between current and deposit accounts very easily. Making and receiving payments is straightforward save the occassional cheque paying in issue and contrary to other reviews I have found cheques always clear within 4 business days no matter the amount.

I've found a&l to be a great bank although our needs are fairly simple and we have a good credit history. We recently won a large contract and needed an overdraft facility to even out the feast and famine of expansion and it took one phone call a quick credit check and that was it the facility was active the next day. They are not without faults ie. Withdrawal limits on the cash line card are too low and the same can be said about the faster payment limit also I use the machine in the branch to deposit cheques which works really well however on the odd occasion I have used it to deposit cash it's rubbish and rejects notes more often than not. Some of the branch staff will deposit the cash over the counter when the machine won't take it but some won't, apparently they are not allowed to take it which is poor. (I think this may change, the last time I spoke to customer services the chap I spoke to said they may start allowing over the counter pay-ins. In reality they provide cheap banking and as far as we are concerned great value and adequate support to our growing business.

They were fine when it came to "automated business" like receiving my cheques and crediting my account. When it came to ad-hoc queries, they were not so good.

Recently I ran out of the pre-addressed (to Bootle) envelopes that I received when I opened my business account 12 months ago. I thought it would be a simple matter to just ask for some more, so I rang A&L up.

When you ring, you get immediately put on the security conveyor belt and don't get a chance to deviate from the script until you pass their security tests. I set my account up nearly a year ago, with standing orders and direct debits, the details of which I've now completely forgotten about. Of course I was asked about those details to "prove who I was". And, of course, I got the answers wrong. I'm obviously not me.

Or. I. Just. Forgot. Insignificant details like standing orders and direct debits. Like everyone else who has a life outside of numbers.

So I failed the security test. And their f@ckwit staff then refused to send out their FREE pre addressed envelopes to me!!!

I asked what security threat I posed in requesting these envelopes and the scouse idiot said I might not be the account holder. I was only asking for free enevelopes for Christ's sake! I asked what threat there was in mistakenly sending envelopes to the account holder if they'd not asked for them. The "assistant" said that the account holder might ring up and deny they'd received them. So f@cking what?!?! Then send some more out you moron, they don't cost much. If you notice a dubious history of envelope requests, THEN take action. Imbeciles.