Ulster Bank Systems are down part 2 *READ* First post

LorrStone

I recieved my Monthly Salary payment today which was due on the 23rd. Well it is showing up on my internet banking (have to go to ATM to be 100%). I can now also review my bank statement, but two standing order that appeared on my mini-statement yesterday have now disappeared. Now to sort out the mess of rent paying, credit cards and figure out who I owe money to etc... :mad:
I said I'd let people know anyway that my money appears to have gone through at last, at least its a bit of hope that things are starting to move.

MadMickeyMonk

lislaw wrote: »

Ilovelucy wrote: »

I'll be staying with them after this is all over. It has been a major inconvenience but they have been more than accommodating to me over the years and these past few days.

I agree, Ulster Bank used to be very accommodating. Up until very recently no payments had ever been declined from my account even if I'd miscalculated and there was insufficent funds. Yes, of course I was charged - usually about €4 as an overlimit fee. Now, in more recent times, DD's have been declined even though the majority of funds are in the account - They bounced my mortgage payment for the sake of less than €5 recently - and charged me €12.50 for the privilege.

Totally agree with the last part of your comment.... I lost my job of 15 plus years and had my mortage paid every month for 10 years and the month I lost my job I left the payment 6.50 short by accident as my mortage was changing between fixed rate to variable. Also had top up so basically have 2 payments a large one and a small one.... Instead of taking the large one and leaving the small one unpaid they did the opposite. I realised the following day, lodged the extra money but they refused to take the payment.... I ended up having to have the balance split over 6 months and added to my total repayment for the 6 months. My own fault I know but I don't think there was any need to do it the way they did it and them knowing my circumstances. That's my only gripe with them other than this load of cobblers at the min

littleteapot

I had a call from a guy at PTSB today because I'm going to be opening an account with them. He said he had been dealing with at least 60 people today who are moving from UB because of the meltdown. That's just one PTSB operator on one day.

lislaw

MadMickeyMonk wrote: »

Totally agree with the last part of your comment.... I lost my job of 15 plus years and had my mortage paid every month for 10 years and the month I lost my job I left the payment 6.50 short by accident as my mortage was changing between fixed rate to variable. Also had top up so basically have 2 payments a large one and a small one.... Instead of taking the large one and leaving the small one unpaid they did the opposite. I realised the following day, lodged the extra money but they refused to take the payment.... I ended up having to have the balance split over 6 months and added to my total repayment for the 6 months. My own fault I know but I don't think there was any need to do it the way they did it and them knowing my circumstances. That's my only gripe with them other than this load of cobblers at the min

Funny enough, that was the exact same that thing that happened to me. A debit for €12 went through on the same day as the mortgage which I wasn't expecting and instead of refusing that one, my mortgage was refused. Wouldn't mind, but the mortgage is with RBS!!

MadMickeyMonk

lislaw wrote: »

MadMickeyMonk wrote: »

Totally agree with the last part of your comment.... I lost my job of 15 plus years and had my mortage paid every month for 10 years and the month I lost my job I left the payment 6.50 short by accident as my mortage was changing between fixed rate to variable. Also had top up so basically have 2 payments a large one and a small one.... Instead of taking the large one and leaving the small one unpaid they did the opposite. I realised the following day, lodged the extra money but they refused to take the payment.... I ended up having to have the balance split over 6 months and added to my total repayment for the 6 months. My own fault I know but I don't think there was any need to do it the way they did it and them knowing my circumstances. That's my only gripe with them other than this load of cobblers at the min

Funny enough, that was the exact same that thing that happened to me. A debit for €12 went through on the same day as the mortgage which I wasn't expecting and instead of refusing that one, my mortgage was refused. Wouldn't mind, but the mortgage is with RBS!!

Ya mines with UB house mortgages. But when I told a girl last week what had happened she said " oh they wouldn't do that ". I told her they did and she can check if she wanted as I was worried they try do the same again when it wouldn't be paid this mothe cos of all this mess. At the time big payment was 580 euro odd and smaller payment was 74 euro and change. 650 in the account and instead of taking the 580 they only took the 74 and change plus their 12.50 unpaid fee. It was only done like that cos they wouldn't get much extra of smaller payment

petes

If my wages were due in the bank but I collected them at the counter will the wages go in to my account with the subsequent debit? I know it's only speculation as no one knows what's going on!

Kassbah

Hey has anyone noticed unusual activity on their online banking over the last few days with ulster bank? My wages were due to go in last thursday, of course they did not go in but on sunday my online banking was showing something like having 20 euro in my account, but yesterday there was 315 euro applied to the account, went to bank this morning and of course they dont know where it came from and when i got back home, went online again and 150 euro was taken from the same account. None of these amounts make sense to me as i never have payments of 315 and none of my direct debits amout to 150.

Anyone else notice anything similar? Gonna get a whole lot more messy before its sorted me thinks!

MadMickeyMonk

Insurgent wrote: »

If my wages were due in the bank but I collected them at the counter will the wages go in to my account with the subsequent debit? I know it's only speculation as no one knows what's going on!

Your wages will show up in your account when it's processed and will stay in your account until they get round to doing the paper deposit/withdrawals. So if youve withdrawn on the back of incoming wages then it could sit in your acc for weeks till they decide to deduct it from your account. This is when loads of people will double spend their money and end up owing money. We see then how accommodating they are about refunding irregular account charges and non payment DDs and SOs fines!

Solair

lislaw wrote: »

Funny enough, that was the exact same that thing that happened to me. A debit for €12 went through on the same day as the mortgage which I wasn't expecting and instead of refusing that one, my mortgage was refused. Wouldn't mind, but the mortgage is with RBS!!

While I'm not defending it, the system's just a relatively unsophisticated computer. It has no intelligence other than just enough to process simple transactions. All it would have done is processed the €12 first because it came in to the queue first. When it put the mortgage payment through after that it would have just had insufficient funds.

If the bank's told it to refuse any over-limit transaction, that's exactly what it will do regardless of who it's going to.

Some banks could perhaps flag something like that for manual review or allow a certain number of overlimit transactions on healthy accounts etc. Some of them are getting extremely tight on that kind of thing since their monumental screw-up and bailout a few years ago as they are trying to avoid any losses.

Similar processes can also cause bank systems to issue letters, put you into a queue for calls from credit control departments etc etc. They're pretty arbitrary and non-human driven decisions.

petes

MadMickeyMonk wrote: »

Your wages will show up in your account when it's processed and will stay in your account until they get round to doing the paper deposit/withdrawals. So if youve withdrawn on the back of incoming wages then it could sit in your acc for weeks till they decide to deduct it from your account. This is when loads of people will double spend their money and end up owing money. We see then how accommodating they are about refunding irregular account charges and non payment DDs and SOs fines!

Cheers

Was thinking that alright. Best to keep a close ey the account so!

MadMickeyMonk

Solair wrote: »

lislaw wrote: »

Funny enough, that was the exact same that thing that happened to me. A debit for €12 went through on the same day as the mortgage which I wasn't expecting and instead of refusing that one, my mortgage was refused. Wouldn't mind, but the mortgage is with RBS!!

While I'm not defending it, the system's just a relatively unsophisticated computer. It has no intelligence other than just enough to process simple transactions. All it would have done is processed the €12 first because it came in to the queue first. When it put the mortgage payment through after that it would have just had insufficient funds.

If the bank's told it to refuse any over-limit transaction, that's exactly what it will do regardless of who it's going to.

Some banks could perhaps flag something like that for manual review or allow a certain number of overlimit transactions on healthy accounts etc. Some of them are getting extremely tight on that kind of thing since their monumental screw-up and bailout a few years ago as they are trying to avoid any losses.

Yes true computers are computers but when a human is told within a few hours of it happening and can prove or show something as silly as 5,6,7 euro short common sense is needed on their part also.

Davidth88

Guys,

with finally some movement on people's accounts .... has any NON UB customer due to be paid by a UB person actually recvd any money.

Now been waiting on my wages for 9 days

Eblana12

Just heard on the radio that UB are currently writing out to all their customers to apologies - forget compo the best we are going to get is a mass produced letter with more of the same drivel we have been getting for the last two plus weeks (unacceptable, very sorry, will fix god only knows when)!!

Captain Pillowcase

I'm not a UB customer but my employer is. Wages were due June 21st and nothing at all, BOI arranged an overdraft but it's running out not too sure I will be able to meet other DD's due to go out. I log on to BOI internet banking every few hours and nothing at all. It's utterly stupid. I feel for everyone who is with UB, all the people I work with are the same we have nothing. Car is working on fumes at the moment. It's been 7 weeks since I have had wages. I can't go on like this nor can the thousands of others stuck. UB need to be raked over coals when the meet with the government. There needs to be more than a bit in the media. It's not fair.
UB you will be getting a letter and you will be paying every charge I incure through someones fat fingers hitting the wrong button. You will also sort out my credit rating when I miss payments through no fault of my own.
And I do understand the front line staff are doing their very best but this is way way beyond a joke now. They need to get it sorted or will we be told mid next week that it will take another week to get sorted and then another and then suddenly is August and I am begging for food??????
:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

Davidth88

Captain Pillowcase wrote: »

I'm not a UB customer but my employer is. Wages were due June 21st and nothing at all, BOI arranged an overdraft but it's running out not too sure I will be able to meet other DD's due to go out. I log on to BOI internet banking every few hours and nothing at all. It's utterly stupid. I feel for everyone who is with UB, all the people I work with are the same we have nothing. Car is working on fumes at the moment. It's been 7 weeks since I have had wages. I can't go on like this nor can the thousands of others stuck. UB need to be raked over coals when the meet with the government. There needs to be more than a bit in the media. It's not fair.
UB you will be getting a letter and you will be paying every charge I incure through someones fat fingers hitting the wrong button. You will also sort out my credit rating when I miss payments through no fault of my own.
And I do understand the front line staff are doing their very best but this is way way beyond a joke now. They need to get it sorted or will be be told mid next week that it will take another week to get sorted and then another and then suddenly is August and I am begging for food??????
:mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

Can totally empathise with you.. in the same boat.

Richie Blackmor

Ogham wrote: »

A small update from Ulster Bank .. just confirms that some progress is being made..

Ulster Bank Latest

"We apologise again to our customers and thank them for their patience.”

This has gone well beyond a test of patience to one of endurance. I have cycled a few Maracycles and Wicklow 200s in the past but, at least there, when you started out you knew where the finish line was. Here, you don't really know where it is at all AND, just in case you might get your hopes up ..... they constantly move it .... just to be sure. I wonder if UB recruited some of their guys from Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo??

Captain Pillowcase

I think everyone is fast losing patience. I wonder if I can tell the bank that I have fat fingers and hit delete on the DD due to go out but if they just hold on in there I should have this matter resoved by the start of next week.........




2015

Think this would work for the tax man too??????

hotchpotch

I have just seen one movement on my account, a standing order has apparently been paid from June 26th. What I now don't understand is how this happened as they still state on the website that they cannot process any domestic or international payments to non-UB accounts at this time - the standing order was for my rent to an account at another bank.
Maybe it is some sort of glitch and it hasn't actually been paid, but I'm wondering if anyone else has noticed a similar movement on their account? I don't have much faith in calling them to clarify this, they've been fairly clueless on the 'helpdesk' so far.
Still no sign of my monthly wages either, which were due before the standing order.

MadMickeyMonk

Guys just saw this on sky news..... Please keep an eye on your mortage payments with UB.....


Last Updated 14:56 03/07/2012
RBS has had to issue another apology for last month's costly technical glitch after confirming duplicate mortgage payments were mistakenly taken from customers at the height of the disruption.

A "relatively small" number of accounts across the country were affected, the company said, in response to complaints.

It is understood RBS and NatWest account holders are involved and RBS said it had increased call centre staff by 50% to handle a potential rise in call volumes.

The bank is urging customers to get in touch if they are experiencing problems and it has promised that no one will be left permanently out of pocket.

A spokeswoman said: "We apologise to any customers experiencing problems today.

"We said last week that we expected to see a few bumps in the road for customers as we get things fully back on track.

"Any customers experiencing problems should contact our call centre or visit their local branch and we will put things right."

Brink

Davidth88 wrote: »

Guys,

with finally some movement on people's accounts .... has any NON UB customer due to be paid by a UB person actually recvd any money.

Now been waiting on my wages for 9 days

Wages that were due to be credited to my account in AIB on June 21st, were received in my AIB account on June 27th. This was the case for everyone's wages in our office EXCEPT for Ulster Bank Customers.

millymoo

Would I need to log on on the laptop to see movement or would the app contain the same info?

lislaw

Solair wrote: »

While I'm not defending it, the system's just a relatively unsophisticated computer. It has no intelligence other than just enough to process simple transactions. All it would have done is processed the €12 first because it came in to the queue first. When it put the mortgage payment through after that it would have just had insufficient funds.

If the bank's told it to refuse any over-limit transaction, that's exactly what it will do regardless of who it's going to.

Some banks could perhaps flag something like that for manual review or allow a certain number of overlimit transactions on healthy accounts etc. Some of them are getting extremely tight on that kind of thing since their monumental screw-up and bailout a few years ago as they are trying to avoid any losses.

Similar processes can also cause bank systems to issue letters, put you into a queue for calls from credit control departments etc etc. They're pretty arbitrary and non-human driven decisions.

Actually that's not true at all. While the initial process is an automatic one, all the branches get in lists every morning of customers accounts which are going to go overdrawn/over credit limits. This is distributed to the relevant staff member who then can make a decision to manually adjust which payments are or aren't paid, to allow an account to go over its limit, who to contact etc etc

MadMickeyMonk

lislaw wrote: »

Solair wrote: »

While I'm not defending it, the system's just a relatively unsophisticated computer. It has no intelligence other than just enough to process simple transactions. All it would have done is processed the €12 first because it came in to the queue first. When it put the mortgage payment through after that it would have just had insufficient funds.

If the bank's told it to refuse any over-limit transaction, that's exactly what it will do regardless of who it's going to.

Some banks could perhaps flag something like that for manual review or allow a certain number of overlimit transactions on healthy accounts etc. Some of them are getting extremely tight on that kind of thing since their monumental screw-up and bailout a few years ago as they are trying to avoid any losses.

Similar processes can also cause bank systems to issue letters, put you into a queue for calls from credit control departments etc etc. They're pretty arbitrary and non-human driven decisions.

Actually that's not true at all. While the initial process is an automatic one, all the branches get in lists every morning of customers accounts which are going to go overdrawn/over credit limits. This is distributed to the relevant staff member who then can make a decision to manually adjust which payments are or aren't paid, to allow an account to go over its limit, who to contact etc etc

Exactly!

Solair

lislaw wrote: »

Actually that's not true at all. While the initial process is an automatic one, all the branches get in lists every morning of customers accounts which are going to go overdrawn/over credit limits. This is distributed to the relevant staff member who then can make a decision to manually adjust which payments are or aren't paid, to allow an account to go over its limit, who to contact etc etc

It depends on the institution. Due to cut-backs / tight cost cutting some of them (especially in the UK) aren't that nice. It will just cause an automatic process to kick in where the transaction's declined, a letter and a string of fees are generated.

The fees some of the UK banks charge are absolutely astronomical too. Seems to be a model being replicated here bit by bit too.

lislaw

Think I'll go back to hiding money under the mattress and in the lining of the curtains

gozunda

lislaw wrote: »

Think I'll go back to hiding money under the mattress and in the lining of the curtains

..Just dont drop the curtains into Oxfam ok....

Pockey

gozunda wrote: »

..Just dont drop the curtains into Oxfam ok....

chasm

Kassbah wrote: »

Hey has anyone noticed unusual activity on their online banking over the last few days with ulster bank? My wages were due to go in last thursday, of course they did not go in but on sunday my online banking was showing something like having 20 euro in my account, but yesterday there was 315 euro applied to the account, went to bank this morning and of course they dont know where it came from and when i got back home, went online again and 150 euro was taken from the same account. None of these amounts make sense to me as i never have payments of 315 and none of my direct debits amout to 150.

Anyone else notice anything similar? Gonna get a whole lot more messy before its sorted me thinks!

Have you made any atm withdrawals. My online account was showing my ATM withdrawals immediately up till today, then this morning i noticed the withdrawal i made on 25/6 was no longer on the account activity and my balance had increased by the amount of the said withdrawal. I'm just assuming it's due to them processing all payments and it will (hopefully) correct itself again when they are finished processing all 25/6 transactions again.
Thankfully, due to years of banking with AIB and having to wait days for POS and ATM transactions to appear on my a/c, i keep a ledger of all my transactions so it's making it easier to see what payments are being removed/applied or reapplied.

Solair

I would assume that there is a lot of manual intervention going on if there are transactions appearing, disappearing and re-appearing!

That does not really bode well for a speedy resolution if there are a lot of transactions involved and they have to be manually repaired.

Just make sure you're keeping your own records of absolutely every transaction that you know to be correct. Anything manual is prone to errors!

lislaw

This update is from the Ulsterbank online service :

**NEW**
Many customers should see an improved position on their accounts today, with account transactions continuing to update. As we work through the backlog you should see your account balances continuing to update over the coming week.

Our Internet Banking and our Smart Phone Apps are available to allow you to view your accounts, make transfers and pay bills. Please note you will only be able to make transfers and pay bills up to the stated balance which may not be up to date. As we update our systems there may be times when the service is temporarily unavailable, if this happens please try again later.