Fun with Big Business, part II

I had a problem with a cashpoint card at my bank.

Not being at home I went to the nearest branch and asked if they could help. They couldn’t, so I asked for the direct line number of my branch. They couldn’t give me that so they gave me the bank’s general purpose number.

I called the number and after five minutes of working through options I got to a human being. I explained everything to them and they put me through to my branch. Except the line went dead and I was left back at square one again.

I called the bank’s general purpose telephone number and tried again. This meant repeating all the above steps except, instead of being put through I was now given a number for the branch. Interestingly, I was asked which of the town’s two branches I wanted despite there only being one. The other branch had shut down over five years before. I called the number but it didn’t connect and here I was at square one again.

I called the bank’s general purpose telephone number and asked to be put through to my branch in such a way that the previous problems wouldn’t leave me stranded again. This time it worked and I talked to a very helpful lady who explained the problem I originally had was now sorted out.

I went back to the nearby branch and tried to use the cash card again. It still didn’t work. They told me to call the bank’s fraud department.

I called the bank’s fraud department and was told I would need to call my branch.

Feeling just the tiniest hint of having been here before, I called my own branch and explained, again, what had happened. The helpful lady from the previous call sorted out the problem. At least I think she has since I now have no time to try the cashpoint card again.

All the bank employees were courteous and as efficient as their system allowed them to be. But what could have been dealt with in less than five minutes took over an hour, robbed me of my lunch break and meant I didn’t complete the fairly simple transaction I had set out to do.

Llyods TSB scores no points.