Hi Debra, did you mean to post on the thread regarding opening a UK bank account whilst living abroad? this thread relates to Barclaycard casting aside ex pats.
I wonder if they'll want to close my account. I haven't used the card for about 10 years, but there's a small credit balance on it. I did ask them to close the account a few years ago, but the performance they wanted me to go through to do so was not worth the effort. Whenever a new card comes I just cut it up and throw it away.
I'm glad that we are not the only ones to have received the same letter.Our's says "We can only temporarily support accounts that are not based in the UK". We have been here 11 years! We too like to keep the card for emergencies. We will also be taking this up and look forward to hearing from others with the same problem or we wait with baited breath in case someone has managed to resolve the problem ..........
We received our letter from Barclays yesterday cancelling one pair of our cards, the ones we have not used since we moved here 10 years ago but no mention of cancelling the ones we both use on a regular basis either when we go back to the uk or buying on-line.
So looks like they are only closing the loss making to them cards and using living abroad as a excuse.
Am i right in thinking that the uk government stopped the credit card companies from closing cards that were used sparingly a few years ago, when they wanted to do the same in the uk.
michael.
True. Mine is not UK, I just realised when I took out the letter my new card came with. I got mine when I was at NUS in Singapore for a term because Barclaycard had an arrangement with the university through the branch of the bank on campus. I take it for granted and my bill is paid by my UK current account without me seeing any more than my online statement. It is strange how we take things for granted.
The banking ombudsman is still responsible for overseeing them in the UK. By not refusing to pay and making either an arrangement or paying a little at a time as a gesture of goodwill unless they can conclusively prove you can clear the account they cannot act. Ask my niece with her student tuition fee loan and all the rest of the credit she was allowed. She was out of the UK for three years but had the sense to make regular gesture payments. Even though she is back there for a year or so she is having no problem at all and her credit card is fine. She was here three weeks ago and hired a car on it in Bordeaux with no problems whatsoever.
Problem is Brian, Barclays in France is not really Barclays in the UK. We discovered all practices are different, and our UK branch knew nothing about the French Barclays and suggested it shared pretty much a name only.
My understanding, having read the Connexion link that Doreen posted is that Barclaycard seem happy to keep your account open if you keep using the card. This hasn't affected me as we have a UK address and as I spent more than half the year in the UK working, I have always been domiciled in the UK, however, my husband has always been domiciled here, doesn't use his Barclaycard (hardly ever) but hasn't received a letter, yet.
I assume as we are in Europe...that if we owed money in the UK and wouldn't pay, France would be required to ship us back anyway!
Carol and Doreen, it raises an interesting point. If they did strike us off and we owe a tidy sum, then we could refuse to pay by saying that we are willing to repay but only by keeping the account open. Then, in fact, we could pay back the debt but use the card consistently to rebalance the repayment to almost what it was before the payment made to them. That could drag it out forever unless they wished to write the debt off, but if they do that for one then the precedent would make it prejudicial to not do it for others. So in an ideal world, if we could get them to agree to keeping it open until we repay, it would also be handy to know another customer who is doing much the same. Would they handle one different from the other.
By not refusing to repay but demanding the account be kept open, it would be grounds for a complaint to the banking ombudsman. We have already seen one of those where Lloyds asked my non-British wife to close her account because she does not live in the UK. The reality was that the few royalties, copyright fees and so on that go in are so trifling in their terms that they did not want to retain the account. She still has it because they hand their wrist firmly slapped for not treating customers equally. She had compared notes with a French friend with an account with them who has a tidy sum of savings from when she worked in the UK who does not use the current account at all who was being encouraged to open a new account.
Let's see. So far I have had nothing and my recently issued replacement has a couple of years to go anyway. My adviser at Barclays here shrugged her shoulders this morning, I called in just to see if they knew anything whilst out shopping that put me near the bank.
Thats an interesting reply from the MD of Barclaycard. He said
“Also, customers who do not use their accounts, but would like to keep them open, can do so by providing us a UK contact address for the account.”
Which is ambiguous, but suggests the 'contact' address is not the clients own address. If someone had a UK address presumably they wouldnt have had a problem with Barclaycard in the first place......the piece goes on to say..
'Barclaycard has cleared up another reader's query on possible fraud by saying account-holders must have a personal UK address and not use another person's address as this would be fraudulent'.
It sounds more like they are worried they wont be able to get back monies if the person lives abroad.
Thanks Doreen. I use mine roughly every three months so probably escape the closure. No doubt I shall hear if they 'sack' me.
I too have received the Barclaycard letter telling me that my Mastercard account will be closed on 9 Jun 14. This is a card that Barclays offered me at one point because they could not recover my Visa card from their machine prior to my trip to USA. I have used this Mastercard as backup security ever since. I use my Visa card regularly for UK purchases and outstanding amounts are paid off on time automatically by my UK offshore bank. I rang Barclaycard and was told that Barclaycard is a UK based company for UK residents and whilst they will give cover temporarily to those abroad it is not their policy to offer financial loans to overseas residents. Eventually my Visa account will be closed as well. I have managed my Visa account now for 40 years without default, which, I think, makes me a good customer but perhaps they prefer customers that do not settle their debts immediately. They seem content to lose good customers and I believe they are acting in a very short-sighted way. A service advisor in India suggested to me that I should volunteer a UK address and arrange for statements to be sent to me in France !!! If all else fails, I'm sure I will find another credit card company that will provide me a service.
I can feel a Victor Meldrew moment coming on....by the way is everyone called Brian or David?
signed Brian David Langston
Praps wait and see how they respond? Don't see how they can force closure of your account just because they're not making a profit out of you - surely that's not their ONLY motive in providing a "service" for their customers....?
(just off to remove tongue from cheek)
Strange one there, I had my Barclaycard renewed automatically just before Christmas. I hardly ever use it and still gets loads of bumph which is useful when we need to light fires in the winter. I have a Barclay's French account too and basically keep the UK one for my daughters' trust funds. I seem to recollect they wanted to introduce a minimum of four transactions a year for non-residents some time back but I binned the letter long ago so can't say for sure. If it is true then on the track record of any bank's reaction to customer complaints/comments/requests then we may have to wave goodbye to the cards. That would be a nuisance for buying flight tickets for example, but no an insurmountable problem. I 'look forward' to a similar letter in the near future then if that is what they are doing, however it might just prompt a complaint to the banking regulator for the sheer hell of it.
Thanks Brian- I have got a Carte Bleu and also have other UK credit cards which seem happy to continue to deal with me over here. Just seems odd that Barclaycard one of the biggest seems to want to offload their non-profitable customers ...