smile service has become much worse

“smile service has become much worse”

Written on: 14/07/2012

We've been banking with smile for years, and initially the service was exceptionally good, but in past two years it has become exceptionally bad. Replacement cards take forever; they lowered our overdraft from an agreed £1000 to £280 despite smilemore allowing for £500; after paying down a considerable amount, they changed our credit card limit without notifying us first and now closing our visa account with no explanation despite always paying on time and never missing a payment, and only a month ago, we paid off the remaining £4000 of our smile loan and this is how we are treated us for it. Customer service takes much longer as well and has become incompetent. We wanted to know about transferring money from a foreign account to our smile account, and after a week, had received no response and wrote again to finally get one several days after, and during that time the exchange rate changed and we lost an estimated £90 due to conversion rate from euro to pound sterling, and all the fault of smile for not replying sooner. The same with other questions to customer service with responses taking several days, and when we tried to call them, the number provided on their letter was no longer in use, and still the case after several months when we received a letter and tried to reach them, though the call was diverted to cooperative, but then the menu system does not allow user access to customer service. I was so annoyed today that I started hitting all numbers and hit the # key on the phone and it got me through and asked the person why it was noted in the automated messages and he said that most callers do not need to talk with support??!! And if we do, then what?

It seems to me that this is intentional to push customers away. I'd read too a year back, and to my dismay, that smile creates a profile for every customer, then rates them, so with all the recent complaints about smile's mistreatment of us and about their poor customer service, it seems that my wife and I have been reclassified as undesireable and they are trying to get rid of us. We will certainly be taking this to the financial ombudsmen, but then they work for the banks instead of customers here.

If anyone can recommend another bank, please do. Smile has gone from exceptional to incompetent and unethical in its treatment of customers, especially noting that they have this customer grading scheme which is based on interactions with their customers, so please note that with every communication, smile is assessing you...truly evil!