Pensioner bonds MELTDOWN

Chaos leaves distraught web users fearing that they’ve invested tens of thousands more than they intended

FRUSTRATED pensioners vented their fury over the Government’s new savings bonds yesterday after an official website went into meltdown–leaving-many-demanding refunds and asking where their money had gone.

Chancellor George Osborne boasted that the bonds for the over-65s were the fastest-selling financial product in modern times, after more than 110,000 pensioners invested a total of £1.15billion in only two days.

But the National Savings and Investments (NS&I) website could not cope with the demand and repeatedly crashed, leading to widespread confusion and payment errors.

Angry customers branded the scheme a ‘shambles’ after experiencing a series of problems, with some investing far more than they wanted to as they mistakenly filled out online forms several times.

To make matters worse, the dedicated 24-hour phone line was also swamped, leaving worried savers unable to claim refunds or find out where their money had gone.

Retired businessman Chris Pearson, 69, who lives near Woking in Surrey, tried three times to invest in bonds for him and his wife but ended up getting error messages saying ‘service temporarily unavailable’ each time after inputting bank details.

The fourth time he was successful and received a confir- mation email. He later contacted his bank and found that £10,000 had already been taken and a further £30,000 worth of payments were due to leave his account.

He tried to get through on the NS&I’s 24-hour helpline to explain his predicament but sat waiting for two and a half hours in the middle of the night without anyone answering. He finally gave up at 4am.

Last night he told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It has been a shambles. To sit on the phone for MAYHEM:

ns&i’s website has repeatedly

crashed hours during the middle of the night and get no answer is crazy. It’s just ridiculous.’

Other customers complained that the online applications crashed mid-way through payments, or failed to send a confirmation notice.

Ray Dixon, 67, from Norfolk, said the process left him with ‘no idea’ whether he would be charged.

He said: ‘What happened was that I appeared to get my bonds, and at the end of the process you go through to the Visa verification. That went through and then suddenly the screen went blank.’

Mr Dixon contacted his bank, which told him the charge had been ‘acknowledged but not cleared’.

He is yet to receive an electronic receipt for his bonds, despite waiting for more than 36 hours. ‘ They must have anticipated there was going to be a rush and should have put on extra staff to cope,’ he said.

Mr Osborne announced the bonds in last year’s Budget in an effort to help older savers demoralised by record low interest rates.

The bonds are available for one and three-year terms, with interest rates of 2.8 and 4 per cent (before tax).

Savers are limited to £10,000 for each type of bond, with couples allowed a maximum of £40,000. But news that the Government will cap the scheme when £10 billion has been invested led to a huge rush.

Mr Osborne said it was ‘the biggest opening sale of any retail financial product in Britain’s modern history’.

NS&I admitted that its website was working only ‘intermittently’.