Nationwide DOUBLES card payments in fresh banking gaffe
That'll be £20, please. That'll be £20, please
Posted in Management, 26th July 2012 12:42 GMT
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Nationwide customers are furious after debit card payments were taken from their accounts twice this week.
Britain's biggest building society has admitted a technical cock-up led to current account holders being charged double for purchases made by card. A spokesperson told The Register some debit card charges that were processed on July 24 went through the system again today, pushing some people over their account limits.
"We'd like to assure customers that they won't be financially disadvantaged," spokesperson said, adding that any charges incurred would be refunded. Customers who have gone over their overdraft limit and have no money for the day should go into a branch or get in touch to get cash.
The spokesperson said the issue was down to "human error" but would not elaborate further. The building society expects payments to be refunded overnight.
The institution's Twitter handle for queries @AskNationwide was bombarded with enraged customer complaints.
"Apologies won't put petrol in my car or buy food, quick enough to take it out but no help when you mess up!" yelled one punter.
"Nationwide are the most incompetent bank EVER, how can my acc with no overdraft be in minus because they been charging everyone twice!" another customer exploded.
After the RBS fiasco and both Santander and Barclays online banking suffering outages, not to mention high levels of fury over the global recession, let's just say banks are not on anyone's Christmas card list. ®
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COMMENTS
"went through the system again again today"
Please tell me that was deliberate ...
All this is, is the banking equivalent of a double post on a forum...
IT outsourced?
When you're outsourcing your IT to High Schoolers in India then this sort of thing will happen occasionally.
Mistakes happen
Anyone who thinks mistakes don't happen probably doesn't work in IT, and anyone who can't empathize with those involved has probably never worked on the sharp end.
The key elements are communication and speed/effectiveness of recovery. Comms have been fairly good so far and it sounds like recovery is well on the way.
What's going wrong in IT delivery and management
Two issues (1) Agencies and (2) HR
See the following advert;
"Reporting to the Vice President of Professional Services, the Project Manager will be responsible for a portfolio of projects, teams and accounts, ensuring successful delivery for the company`s thousands of clients. It is a challenging, varied position, so the successful project manager will need experience in 2 or more vertical industries. A technical IT background is preferred but not essential (software development, infrastructure technologies, E-commerce) and a Project Management Qualification would be an advantage. You will also need a 2:1 or Higher from a leading University."
So some IT experience is useful (this is a software house by the way), but not required
A Prince2 ticket, not fussed, and no minimum project management experience stated.
But you MUST have a 2:1 degree from a Top University. Ok how does an Art History 2:1 make sure your client has a working system, with robust operational practices in place before you go live?
HR have started butting in on IT recruitment, in order to justify their jobs, bespite being unable to understand the JD or CV, let alone make a cogent comment on them.
Agencies. I'll start with appologies now to the agents that do understand the subjects and advise their clients appropriately, but unfortunately you're out number by the call centre operators out there.
Thus we have large organisations handling key parts of the UK's financial infrastructure, using people that are frankly sub-par, selected on the basis of random criteria, rather than a practical understanding of the job!
IT delivery will not improve until the CIO take back control of their delivery teams, an assert responsibility for getting it right.
......in the mean time wait for the next bank/building society to arse up a few million accounts.
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