The link I posted makes shocking reading,especially the letters, but as they say it is barely even the tip of the iceburg.
I've lost count of the number of times their constant failings and inability to right them have been reported in TV consumer programmes.
Their are numerous other links like the one I posted demonstrating just how bad they really are.
As they say it gets boring after a while and it is absolutely impossible to keep track of any more than a tiny fraction of them.
I have had long term connections with Abbey with whom I have always been reasonably happy going back more than thirty years.
Since Santander UK got involved it's been an absolute nightmare.
They have obviously bitten off far more than they are able to chew and brought with them some of their shoddy couldn't care less Spanish practices thinking all they needed to pull the wool over everyones eyes was a massive ad campaign and so called givaway offers.
My personal experience on the Spanish side going back more than twenty years seems to be the exception and has not been too bad, apart from their repeated attempted rip-offs which caught out a few of my pals and I have experienced reasonable service in my local Spanish office which I put down to a very close relationship with friendly and helpful staff.

my daughter is 31 and has a full set, helped by a godmother who worked at the bank.

lets not tell my ex our daughter might have something valuable, she might try to sell them

As little as a couple of years ago, I banked with British banks. Not a big deal as a small customer. I've turned Spanish since then, without being consulted.

I'm not too worried, the big boys know what they're going, don't they? Don't they?

I might take out a small amount to stick under the mattress.

I might do that with a large amount... At least that way there wouldn't be the exorbitant bank charges to pay!

I was with Abbey and I suppose I still am, though it's now called Santander.

There was one strange benefit when Santander took over. Abbey wouldn't let me use my Spanish address to run my account and I had to use an English one and had my letters and bank statements sent over. When I wrote to them after the takeover, they were happy to register my Spanish address - they could hardly do otherwise.

I now get the bad news two days earlier and can't tell the difference from the previous ones.

Hate to tell you but I don´t bank with them and would not touch an English bank ever again either do not pay any bank charges at the bank we use because we are pensioners, sorry I lie, 25€ per annum for cards.
You are correct about not reading that stuff, do not read any newspaper as one just ends up full of the crap that is fed to one and people are daft enough to believe it all.


Graham

I have (for the moment) 2 Halifax accounts and an LTSB current acct.

When I wanted to make a payment from one of the Halifax to LTSB the Online Banker told me it couldnt do it. I was told over the phone the acct wasnt "the sort that allows you to do that", so, I visited my local Halifax branch, took out CASH and (literally) walked across the road to LTSB and pay it in to my acct there.

Both are part of the Lloyds Banking Group, but after more than 2 years are still trying to get their systems to talk to each other.

Don't see how we can criticise any Eurozone failure when we can't get our own act together. Especially when a good percentage of the staff working on the amalgamation of computer systems have been laid off.

Much to my surprise, the Germans have voted, overwhelmingly, to keep pumping money into Greece. Maybe Crete is still on their conscience.

nope, on their shopping list