Agents have begun reporting concerns that Barclays has suspended access to their business bank accounts.
Vijay Vashistha, co-founder of online agent 99home, said he noticed on Monday that he could no longer access his Barclays Bank business account and was told an internal review was being conducted which could take up to seven working days to complete.
Estate Agent Today has been told that at least three other estate agency brands have faced similar issues this week where they have received RG21M error codes, meaning account access is suspended but there is no suggestion that these cases are linked.
Vashistha said no notice was given of the account restrictions or review and said it has meant no payments could be made this week, including rent owed to landlords, direct debits to suppliers and staff wages.
He told Estate Agent Today: “We are losing trust from landlords as a result of this and it is hitting us unfairly on the lettings and management side.
“Barclays has come to review our account as well as a few other estate agents without any notifications prior to blocking us.
“There is a long list of transactions we can’t do as all outgoings are blocked.
“We are not stopping them to run their regular compliance check but without disturbing business.
“I would suggest agents not to rely on Barclays and if they are using this bank they must use a backup system.”
A Barclays spokesperson said: “Due to customer confidentiality, we are unable to share any further information.”
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We had notifications on all our accounts on the web pages of our accounts
Ands letters
We completed new KYC and updated some stuff with them
Took about 2-3 months to confirm all new requirements but we passed
Luckily we have a hands on Bank manager
Im surprised Vijay didn't get this like us
Im hearing of similar things with other banks
Draconian
Many thanks Lee
We did submitted all the documents last year and all was clear.
It's all sorted now but I will be going ahead with my complain.
Kind regards
Vijay
We have had a similar problem. I think we have been on with this for over 6 months. Barclays have been terrible. Poor contact and no help ! Multiple threats to freeze accounts. The lowest of the low customer service. I even hand delivered forms to the branch as they kept loosing the information. Think they lost them as well . At one stage i was told by a member of staff in the local branch that the forms i needed to fill in was all a scam.
This process has taken so much time it is unbelievable. If it wasn't so difficult to change banks we would switch to another bank .Some of my friends have similar problems with other banks but not nearly as bad as Barclays. Zero for help and customer service.
My experience with Barclays was good. That's because I have a customer account manager who took responsibility. My experience with another bank was dreadful. They claimed to have written (I'm satisfied they did, but with the post office it could have gone anywhere) but we never received their letter requesting info. They could not explain why they did not email to create an electronic trail. It took me a year to reopen the account only after escalating it to their complaints team. Even dealing with them was a nightmare resulting in being passed around 11 different departments and finally ending up with the one I started. Fortunately, it was just a savings account. The key is that you must not ignore any correspondence and you need a personal client manager who will take your call and take responsibility. I only deal with banks that have this structure. This is all about compliance fear. My view is that any correspondence to customers of this nature should be by special, signed for delivery.
PS And escalate to their internal complaints team quickly. This provides structure to your problem.
So it isn't just PPI claims where Barclays make life as hard as they can for customers!
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