Truely awful bank. Switched to them to run our day to day finances. Difficult to use online banking, terrible, terrible customer service staffed by seemingly competely untrained staff. Switched to Lloyds now, whilst far from perfect, by comparison seem a paragon of customer service excellence.

Unfortunately kept a v. large amount of money in a savings account with them since the interest rate was good. All the while they have been charging my current account because I was not making use of it - which has of course now put me in overdraft, which they have charged me for. All of this they have been doing for months without notifying me.

Of course I can't close the account without clearing the overdraft, so I can't dispute the charge and freeze the account in the process. Even with many thousands in an account with them I don't feel like a valued customer in any way at all

Awful Awful Awful...keep your money under your bed rather than keep it with this bank (it will be safer!)

Another angry AL/Santander customer, who was promised that if i switched all of my monies over to them, i would receive £150 after 12 months, I was given the option of 2 accounts, one in which I would receive £100 almost straight away for joining them at a lower interest rate or 2 at a higher interest rate I would recieve £150 at the end of 12 months, both me and my partner went for this, he opted for the £100 which he received and I opted for more at a later date, Sam the man who works in Santander in Folkestone, Kent sold me the productand now denys all knowlege of it, I am furious, and to top it off, I have received no follow up from my complaint. My strong advise also stay well clear, They shouldnt be able to get away wit it, oh and weren't they on watch dog recently?!!!!

Since Santander took over the adminisration of A & L accounts it has become a shambles trying to resolve anything. Several issues have needed to be resovlved yet no one seems to be able to actually do it. In branch they inform you to call the telephone banking; they transfer you between departments - each time security checked - yet noone is able to do what is requested. Maybe they should be competency checked as the service is consistent but consistently abysmal. the decision to leave didn't take long; however, I have now been trying to get my account switched for 2 months.
I have now escalated this through the complaints department. 4 calls today and no-one was able to try and resolve a simple request to forward on my direct debit mandate. Unbelieveable inefficient - and the poor service is the best you can expect.

I CLOSED THIS ACCOUNT MORE THAN ONE YEAR AGO BUT CANNOT STOP THE FLOOD OF EMAILS FROM SANTANDER.
I WOULD TELL MY FRIENDS DON'T TOUCH SANTANDER.

Since Sandander has taken over Alliance and Leicester Premier Direct telephone bank I have had nothing but trouble. Do not touch this bank. Just to transfer a small amount of money to another bank account is a quest in itself. It takes ages over the phone talking to security. I have had my account blocked because I could not answer one of their silly questions causing massive inconvenience. This bank is terrible. I have another telephone bank with First Direct and they are excellent. Be warned!

This is the worst bank I have ever come across - it charges youi for being in credit with several thousand pounds if you have not paid in £1000 in the last month - utter stgupidity. Rating less than zero

I would advise anyone not to open an account with Santander. I had a £50K bond with them and a current account. The bond matured in May 2009 and I cashed this in and reduced my current account balance to £3 credit. I have now received a letter advising me I owe them £156 - because I have not used the account. The account was on online one and, as far as I was concerned, as the account was in credit there was no need to check the balance. The whole overdrawn balance is as a result of charges for not using the account. I asked why they had not sent me a statement or a letter when the charges first were debited, but was told it was up to me to check my balance.!!!!!!! Having worked in a bank for 30 years (hsbc) this is the first I have heard of customers being charged for customers keeping their account in credit but incurring charges for not using it.

When A&L moved over to Santander i was unable to access my online account for weeks. Took numerous phone calls. santander are taking over, they now run the services on Debenhams/Topman account cards, their customer service is rock bottom, you have to speak to foreign people on the phone who are not able to have a cnversation with you or understand why you are calling. Santander sre the pits which is why i switched my current account immediately and wouldnt recommend anyone joining this company.

If I could have done a minus rating on all I would have!!!!!
I opened an account with The Alliance and Leicester over two yoears ago and after such hassle with them after only a month I requested to close the account. Of course I was told I could not just close my account and infact would have to leave a sum of £5 in the account while they processed my request. I have now received my first letters to inform me firstly they have decided to cancel my over draft.......on an account I thought I no longer had as I have not until opening this said letter had any corrispondance other than junk mail to my spam box online and then a bill of £150.16, which I had actually incurred over the past two years, it has cost me another £45 of charges of not having an overdraft and being in debt for the said sum for the pleasure of finding out I still had an account. The banks are of no use and as the useless manager informed me she was unable to bring anything up on the system! She was not even able to give me my 'contract' for the account! I had already spent one hour on the telephone prior to this and had been told I would need to go to the bank! I then spent anothe fourty minutes on the banks telephone for all to hear trying to close the account and get some information. They are unable to send me the 2008 terms and conditions, could not answer why I had not been informed that I at any point I had gone in to my over draft or the fact I was in it when they decided to whip the rug out from under me and decide to close the overdraft!
But what can I say! What can any of us say, nothing that would not possible follow in a law suite!
The most commical thing after all the chap had read and listened to, the chap closing my expensive and only used for for one month, assumed closed account offered to change the account to another I would not be charged!!! After they had taken £195.16 off me! PLEASE!!!

So I would say stay clear! Being taken over says it all and if a bank needs to advertise....

I am writing this review as a serious warning to others who are considering using the Alliance and Leicester switching service. If I could give a negative score I would have done so. I was shocked on carrying out a basic online search at the number of people who have had similar experiences before me and yet there has been no change in the behaviour of Alliance and Leicester

I am in the situation that Direct Debits have been switched by Alliance and Leicester from my current bank but no funds had been transferred to cover these and no overdraft had been put in place to cover any issues created from Direct Debits being transferred by them before my salary.

On receipt of a letter advising me that my account was "now switched" I checked my existing bank and noticed that the full balance was still present...my employer confirmed they had not received a letter requesting them to transfer my salary payment (apparently it did arrive in the post later that day - a little late considering)

On contacting Alliance and Leicester I was advised of the following:

1. 2 DD's had been transferred (but they didn't know when the monies were due to be taken?) but I need to put money in to cover them in case they are called before my salary goes in next week - as it takes banks up to 5 working days to transfer money what was their solution for the interim? (see 3. below)
2. Other DD's may be transferred and called before my salary goes in - I need to make sure that there is money in the account to cover these but they don't know which ones this may apply to ...(again banking times to transfer money come into play ....)
3. Their solution to 1 & 2 above was either I pay for same day transfer of funds or may favourite option, I contact the companies with whom I have DD's and pay them over the phone to try to prevent a DD being taken ........
4. I could have an overdraft to cover this one week issue created by transferring DD's before salary, but only if I had an overdraft with the previous bank (???). As I do not go into debt I had no need of an overdraft with my previous bank! So I automatically don't qualify for one with Alliance and Leicester .....

Fortunately, with the assistance of my current bank I have been able to go through all the DD's and check if any will be taken before my salary is paid into Alliance and Leicester...and manage the transfer effectively myself with their assistance

I will be leaving Alliance and Leicester as soon as possible and will not be allowing them to have any involvement in the transfer - I will manage this myself as it would have taken less time than I have spent trying to get Alliance and Leicester to assist to no avail and will certainly create a lot less stress and risk to my credit ratings.

If you strip out the marketing gimmicks, this is a horrible bank to deal with. Customer service is non existent in my opinion. Letters are ignored and to add insult to injury, a promise to pay £5 into my account as a good will gesture was debited from my account either in error or on purpose-I don't know.
Then I had to argue with A and L to get this further error connected. Literally pounds spent hanging on the phone to no effect.
Awful. I've closed my account.

I have been with Alliance & Leicester for around 15 years. In that time I have seen their customer service go from second to none to the most woefully inadequate service I have ever had the misfortune of coming across!
The customer service department have absolutely no clue to the point where they will actually lie to you not only on the phone but in writing. I am a credit card fraud investigator so I have a better than most understanding on how debit and credit card transactions work, I could not believe the incorrect information I was being fed!
The staff are extemely rude, incompetent and the change to Santander I don't doubt will not improve matters.
I suspect that the volume of calls target is more important that quality of service. If that is the case then they are doing a good job as they seem to spend the entire call fobbing you off as quickly as possible. Letters are frequently ignored.
Be careful with their charges, they are known for their underhand tactics for applying charges to accounts that are...I would consider fraud! I don't use that word lightly!

The online service is without doubt the worst i have ever used.Halifax is absolutely miles ahead in that respect. The Premier Direct a/c is fine for the first year to take advantage of the high interest rate. However i have written to customer services twice to ask them what my options are after the high interest rate runs out, and if i keep a/c open do i have to continue to fund it with £500 mth. Once again no response. Their customer service is simply terrible. I have 2 current accounts and an online saver. However the online transfer function will only allow me to transfer funds from the saver to one of the current accounts. I asked customer services to link the online saver to both current accounts as i plan to close the premier direct when rate runs out and they said it wasn't possible! This would mean i would then have a current a/c and online saver i couldn't transfer a thing between! The service agent even suggested i close my savings a/c! Terrible service- use them for the rate and get out to a well run bank a/c

Timing are particularly bad. We have 2 current accounts and one savings (all joint accounts) but money transfered in between can take anything upto 4 days - with money 'floating' around the banking system no where to be seen. When we use swich in shops it can also take several days for it to show on our accounts this was more obvious at Christmas with the two of us shopping at different times and spending alot of money. Due to this it in near impossible to keep track of how much money is in our current accounts. Customer Service very unhelpful and uninterested. They contradict their complaints procedures stated on the webpages. We will be closing all accounts that have only been open since May 2008.

One advantage of internet banking is supposed to be being able to track your account quickly whereever you are in the world. Alliance & Leicester's over-elaborate security arrangements completely defeat the point: 1) You need to remember an 8 digit ID number (different from your account or card number) to access the account. This is a random password, not a username you can select yourself. They advise you to write it down - which means you need to have it with you at all times e.g. in order to access the account at work or on holiday etc. (In addition to this you need to remember your phone pin, internet pin, and a picture with a key-word.) 2) Some countries are deemed 'unsafe' and you can't access your account online from those countries. Unfortunately I am now based in India, which A&L considers "unsafe" - even though Halifax, Barclays, American Express, Intelligent Finance, and Bank of America have no problem with it. So this is my only account which I cannot access. If I'd known all the hassle I would never have taken out the account and plan to change as soon as I return to the UK. (There is also a lower withdrawal limit than other accounts, the phone customer service is extremely hard to access, the balance is not instantly updated, and the website functionality is clunky compared with Halifax online accnt.).

Not really had any problems with my Alliance and Leicester direct current account. Will switch after interest rate falls I think though - no prizes for loyalty!