I’ve always got a DIY project going on at home, so I’m a bit of a nerd when it comes to paint. There’s a textured paint that looks like stone, which I bought a while back to revamp my fireplace. This paint is fantastic, but pretty expensive. So when the company I ordered if from threw in the recommended natural bristle brush as a freebie, I was happy.
But when the paint arrived, there was no brush. Thinking it had been overlooked, I called the firm. I got through to one of the business owners who told me they’d run out. Fair enough, but it would have been nice to have been told. A simple ‘out of stock’ on the dispatch note would have done.
The free brush offer was also still listed on the website but when I pointed this out to the owner, she became defensive. This was just a small family-run business, I was told. The technology used to run the website couldn’t update these things automatically and they couldn’t afford an upgrade. They didn’t have the time to update these things manually either.
I love small businesses and I understand they don’t have it easy, but all this put me off as a customer. I tried to explain how this hadn’t created a good impression on me, a first-time customer, but it fell on deaf ears. I haven’t used this company since.
My experience with another small firm – an online business from which I’d ordered a glass clock – was so different. The owner had been let down on this by her European suppliers and was so apologetic and friendly that I was happy to wait for my order. I waited three months but in the end it needed to be cancelled due to the ongoing supply issues. I was disappointed, of course, but I was offered a discount on anything else I wanted from the website.
I mention those two contrasting experiences because of an experience I had recently while trying to help my mum with her banking. My mum is a younger pensioner and though still in the active retirement phase, she does have a few health issues that clip her wings. Like the hip pinning she had several years ago after slipping on some leaves. Walking long distances has got harder and she doesn’t drive.
When it comes to financial matters, the big problem is that my mum has never been comfortable talking on the phone about ‘official’ things. She gets nervous about what to say and doesn’t know how best to put things. And because she’s focusing on that, she doesn’t always take in what’s being said to her.
My dad used to deal with all that stuff and when he died, I started stepping in as I realised my mum needed a bit of help.
Requesting a new debit card for my mum from NatWest to replace one that had worn out should have been quick and easy. With mum and I both in the same room, GDPR should have been no problem to navigate. But everything about this call was painful and it took about 40 minutes.
My mum had lost her glasses and struggled when NatWest’s customer services agent insisted she read out her debit card number herself, as that was the required procedure. To tick that box, I had to read the number out to my mum, who then repeated it down the phone to the agent.
Then the agent discovered my mum’s phone number was out of date on the system and without that, she said there was nothing she could do. It was only when I asked whether the agent was aware of the Consumer Duty – to which I got no answer – and NatWest’s responsibilities towards vulnerable clients that we were passed to the over-60s helpline.
The agent there was brilliant but was still unable to send my mum a new debit card due to the out-of-date phone number. For that, mum was to visit a branch with some ID. It wasn’t ideal – the local branch has permanently closed and I’ve already explained mum’s difficulty with longer distances. Mum would potentially be left without access to cash because her debit card was unreliable. But at least we knew what to do.
When I got home, I decided to tell NatWest what had happened in an email. I was worried how my mum would have fared if she hadn’t had someone with financial services knowledge to speak up and get transferred to the over-60s helpline.
At this point, I have to give credit to NatWest. They swiftly apologised and started to investigate. Neil Wainwright, the firm’s customer protection manager, was amazing. He spoke to mum and me to get everything sorted without mum having to get to a physical branch. NatWest also gave mum some cash as a goodwill gesture and if we need anything else we just need to ask.
I told NatWest I was writing about our experience and asked for a response. A spokesman told me its staff are trained to recognise the differing needs of customers including vulnerabilities that may be present. “They have access to supportive guidance on how to help and can refer to the specialist teams we have available to support customers with more complex needs,” he said.
Customers can also tell the bank about any support they need through “Banking My Way”, a free service that can be used within its mobile app, online banking or by speaking to a member of staff.
But after listening back to our calls, NatWest acknowledged it let us down. “We had several opportunities throughout the discussion to give you both a better experience, including a missed opportunity to handover the call to Neil’s team,” the spokesman said. “As a result of your email we have arranged additional training to be given to the colleagues involved.”
All of us get it wrong sometimes – it’s the care and effort we take to put things right that really counts.
