My Isa transfer won’t go through – and I’m losing cash
I SENT a form on September 25 to transfer £40,000 to my Skipton Building Society cash ISA from my National Savings and Investments (NS&I) Direct ISA. I contacted Skipton three days later and staff confirmed they had sent it by firstclass post to NS&I.
On October 5 the transfer had not gone through and Skipton confirmed they were still awaiting a response.
On October 22 they confirmed that they had chased NS&I a few times but had still not heard back.
Three days later I contacted NS&I which confirmed the money had not gone. They said they had received an illegible letter from the Skipton and that they had not received the transfer form.
I asked why they couldn’t speak to each other about it and they said they couldn’t discuss a customer’s account with another bank/building society. I, therefore, had to contact Skipton again to try to get this sorted out.
I wonder which of the two providers will compensate me for loss of interest when this is finally sorted? S. S., Lincoln. Well, this is a case of Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee with both parties blaming the other and you and I being left to get to the bottom of it.
Skipton’s records show that it sent a letter and transfer papers to NS&I as soon as it received them. It chased a week later when it didn’t hear back from NS&I, and again two weeks after that. It was only when you contacted NS&I that you and Skipton were made aware that NS&I couldn’t find the full paperwork.
NS&I, for its part, confirms that Skipton wrote on october 10 stating they had sent a transfer request but the funds had not been received. NS&I says that as it could not find the forms, it wrote to Skipton on october 12 but did not receive a reply.
It received a letter from Skipton on october 26 and replied on october 29 saying there was no transfer showing — presumably meaning the money was still sitting in your NS&I account!
In the end, your transfer went through on october 30, a month after you requested it.
all of this just underlines how daft it is that 28 years after Tim Berners-lee invented the world wide web, NS&I and building societies are playing with paper systems for something as important as an Isa transfer. No doubt they also work out your interest on an abacus.
The good news is that Skipton will backdate the interest to the point of your application and has apologised to you, as well as offering a goodwill payment. FOR more than 30 years we had a business account with BT. In 2016 we had the worst time of our lives when my husband was made bankrupt and we lost our business and family home. I wrote to BT asking it to cancel the phone contract and to give us a cheaper domestic line.
Eventually it stopped sending bills to the business and put them into my name. I have written several times providing proof of the bankruptcy, but BT still keeps us on a business account.
After my last letter BT staff said they could not cancel the business account without considerable cost. I asked for confirmation in writing but have not received it. Mrs F. E., Wirral. IT SeemS that BT had been supplying the old account number rather than your new domestic one.
It has now contacted you and placed you on to the best possible deal, it says. BT has also arranged a refund of a year’s line rental as a gesture of goodwill. In addition, you have been provided with the senior customer service team’s details so you can contact them in the future should you need to.