“First Direct are supposedly great on customer service and I can only assume they paid someone a lot of money for this myth.
I used my FD Gold credit card to book a hotel in Spain that cost a total of £1513.
For this, FD have charged me £12 for going £13 over my agreed £1500 credit limit and a further £45 sterling to Euros conversion fee. Firstly, the transaction should have been rejected if my £1500 limit was broken and secondly the £45 conversion to Euro fee is just a blatant rip off.
The reason for FD gave me for "allowing" the over agreed transaction was "to save me potential embarrassment", I wont be embarrassed, I'd choose another payment method ! and the extortionate £45 sterling to Euros fee, of course they've hidden behind the usual small print.
Anyway, If their customer service was good, they'd have warned me at point of transaction about all these fees. If their customer service was great, they'd have contacted me to advise me to use my Halifax Clarity card, which would have attracted no fees for this transaction whatsoever. If their customer service was 5 star, they wouldn't charge £12 for going £13 over my agreed limit and £45 for the to 2 seconds it takes to convert Sterling to Euros. Predictably for a bank, the name of the game is their profits and implementing charges hidden in small print that no one reads. But please don't try and sell yourself on the customer service because you're no better than most banks and a lot worse than quite a few !!”
“I’ve been with first direct over 20 years and I’m totally fed up. Half the payments I make are stopped for fraud checks, with no good reason. I even made one on the phone, fully verified and validated, and again it’s stopped for fraud. This adds 12-24 hours delay, and means a painful 15 minute phone call with an Indian call centre. They don’t do any research or use any intelligence at all, it’s exhausting. This has gone on for so long I see no other solution than to move to a more modern bank.”
“I rang the customer service line to report a fraudulent transaction on my account. I considered it fraudulent as I did not approve the transaction. Bearing in mind 1st direct have on numerous occasions rung me to confirm whether transactions I had approved via their app are fraudulent or not I was perplexed and very angry that when I rang them to advise them they were dismissive and to add insult to injury when I raised my concerns they dismissed this also. It was not just that they were dismissive but also that the attitude and manner in which I was spoken to was derogatory with the comment "would you like to moan at my manager now" when I'd asked to speak to them. I actually felt as thougt he was laughing at me! I would have thought they would be grateful to be advised of current scams affecting their long standing customers - currently apps of 20 years. Perhaps it's time for a change, their unique selling point was customer service, used to be second to none - now it seems isn't even worthy of stating it second rate!”
“I work in the US. My family live in the U.K. I transferred money to my first direct account before Christmas to ensure my family had a lovey festive time. I am still waiting for that money to arrive. Andrew Milne and Jane Dwyer keep assuring me MY money will arrive “tomorrow”. And. I am still waiting. First direct is a joke. They have not helped at all. I now have to borrow money to buy food. What is going on??”
“Appalling, aggessive customer service. Currently trying to close an online savings account with them. I waited for an hour on their chat for a representative, who said the account would be closed in 6 working days. It wasn't, so I logged on again and waited another hour to talk to a representative.
The rep said that she doesn't understand why the account isn't closed, but can't do anything about it within the limitations of their chat system. She told me to phone FirstDirect customer service. I have already tried that, but told the rep that I opened the account online and I don't know my telephone password. He threatened to block my account. I asked my husband to come and help me, and the rep said he had to leave the room or the conversation would be terminated and my account would be blocked. By this time I was almost in tears and I'm too nervous to phone them again.
So to date I still haven't closed my account. I tried to lodge a complaint with FirstDirect but they wouldn't pass me to their complaints department without a telephone password, and again threatened to block my account. I'm very upset and don't know what to do.”
“Worst bank. I have an excellent credit rating and my loan was rejected and not even an alternative option was presented or offered. Now there is a hard credit check in my report.”
“Ghastly, incompetent service. Takes ages to get through to have call answered. You are then passed on to someone else.. long wait ghastly music. They cannot deal with the query so passed to another person...long wait because we are busy. More ghastly music. Person cannot answer query so will send answer through second class post. We ahve tried 5 times to go through this awfu process using 4 different activatation codes and many hours on the phone. Only to be told at 5th attempt there was a problem First Direct end and they will sort it and send yet another activation code by second class post that make take up to 10 days. Unbeleivably incompetent. Steer well clear. Often peopl at the other end have strong Scottish accents and make it very difficult to follow a conversation. However, they are always very polite and apologetic for the poor service.”
“I’ve been with first direct for 25 years but I would advise everyone to give them a wide berth. Charming people who asked for all your details then keep passing you on to someone else who asks you the same questions the previous person asked ending up after a long time the line goes dead and like me who has a payasyougo phone you have gone through a fortune on your phone and end up changing your bank to one that can avctually help you. I can only give no stars for first direct.”
“Apart from the whole process being painful, I didn't even receive the £175 offer - I scanned the code, installed and opened the app - nothing - they are just trying to lure new customers in without honouring their offer!
A scam, con and zero stars for you lot!”
“If I could give FirstDirect no stars I would. I phoned them with a question about my online savings account with them. Because I've never used telephone banking with them, I don't know my telephone banking password and they couldn't complete security. I understood that, but trying to resolve the issue with them was like dealing with robots. I'm not actually sure whether I was talking to real people. Instead of having a conversation with me about the issue, they just kept repeating their policies to me. I think they were reading their responses from a computer screen. I was having trouble understanding what they were saying so I passed the phone to my husband and asked him to find out what they needed from me. They refused to talk to him and even refused to talk to me until I confirmed that I was on my own. They then asked me to confirm that I wasn't recording our phone call.... why would I do that?!!
In the end I was so distressed I put the phone down without resolving the issue. The whole thing was a farce.”
“Awful, awful. outsourcing calls
Rang for a simple transaction receipt as not able to help in the chat advised to ring up. Huge mistake! Failed voice recognition so blocked all access to my account. Been on hold for over 30 minutes. This was supposed to be a simple thing to do. Will seriously reconsider banking with them if they don't get there act together and sort out basic features and their awful voice recognition that does not work. Awful experience”
“Pointless having a bank account that you can't get an app for on your phone. I can't update the app on my phone as First Direct have deemed my perfectly adequate phone too old. Cost cutting to annoy customers.”
“Rubbish app - poor design and sign up process. Total joke how much effort it takes to open an account with this lot. No wonder the likes of Chase are doing well as their on boarding is simple, straight forward and secure.”
“If you forget your online banking login details, don't call up. You will not have access to your app as they will lock you out! Is that really the best way around customer service?!”
“I set up an account recently and then attempted to switch from my old co op account. Impossible! First of all when I tried to convert my account from sole to joint I was told 'no problem we can do it over the phone' and then when attempting this I was told we have to set up a whole new account jointly. Life's too short. A week later I tried again via the app which said to call if I want to switch from my joint account with co op to sole acc with FD. NOOO can't do that either. So realising they are as useless as my previous bank I told them to close account as I now have no intention of using them. Of course they said they couldn't do that either. You really couldn't make it up! So don't be fooled by these 'best bank' reviews. They really are completely useless. I'll stick with Co op. That's how bad First Direct are. Goodbye.”
“FD has forgotten about cheques. They used to have a paying-in machine (Portsmouth branch anyway) that worked perfectly. Now the local branch is closed and the nearest is about 10-12 miles round trip away plus parking. I arrived there at 16.31 - HSBC bank just closed with no letter box. Sent cheque by overnight Royal Mail (£6.35), plus another 10 miles or so round trip travel. That was last week. Kindly, FD reimbursed me £20 for my troubles. So today my £300 should be in sight, right? Well no, because although we agree that the cheque arrived on Friday morning of last week, on-one knows where it is nor when it will be cleared. The nice Scottish lady on the 'phone said it could take 14 days. But that was the trick the banks used to play when I first opened my an account 60 years ago; surely cheque processing has progressed since then. Not at FD it hasn't. So come on, FD get a grip; being an optimist I hope to have some news tomorrow. But the news for anyone processing cheques through FD is: beware!”
