Santander UK Reviews 

Time wasters!!!!
Waited couple of weeks for a telephone appointment to open a business curent account with Santander UK to use for purchasing a property with a newly formed limited company and they said that the company needs to own the property already in order to qualify for a bank account. That doesn't make sense. So what you suppose to do? Are they suggesting to use a personal current account? They are so incompetent!!!

Told my wife’s debit card may not have worked due to exceeding a bank limit. The employee then said she was unable to tell us what the limit for contactless payments is! Service at this bank has dropped alarmingly recently .

Ignore the one star reviews. I can’t understand what everyone is complaining about. We’ve been with Santander for 12 years and it’s really reliable. We are a limited company and we wouldn’t tolerate any poor service.

This bank is absolutely shocking for businesses. We have had a well run account for a business for 5 years and have started a new business with all the same director/staff contacts involved. We completed new account forms in early December 2022 and still at 13th April 2023 we do not have any accounts opened for the new co. And even worse than this we have had no emails from them about it and we have had to constantly chase for any updates - of which there are none. I strongly advise you to go elsewhere as this bank do not deserve your custom. Out of desperation we have opened an account with Nat West and it took about 10 days from beginning to end! If I could give less than 1 star I would. As an update it's now 9th May and still no Santander accounts!!

Santander closed my business account forcing me to have to prematurely close my limited company. There was no reason provided. I called the help desk and waited a substantial time to speak with an advisor and was told they do not require to provide a reason.

My account has been in credit for 5 years with no issues. I am still now waiting over 1 month for the balancing check and final statement to be sent for my accountant and had to call the support desk twice about the issue, still the balancing check or statement has not been received. Santander you have caused a great deal of stress and worry. Where is my balancing check.? I will have to resort to reporting this matter to the FCA and ombudsman if not resolved ASAP. Why is the service quality so poor for Business banking? , the Santander help desk is not adequately manned with unacceptably long wait times for a 'business bank'.

Just the worst bank ever for customer service. Avoid!

I recently had to defer my December mortgage payment as I was awaiting other funds to be credited to my bank. Santander lady I spoke to was really helpful (I was quite upset at the time as I’d never paid late before and I was under a fair bit of stress due to bereavement). She delayed my payment for 2 weeks without me incurring any charges or any affect on my credit file. They set up an automatic text to remind me to pay on the agreed date - very useful when you have brain fog!
They set up the new direct debit for me after I cancelled it, but unfortunately it didn’t take January’s payment. I only realised a few days ago when I got a text. I called Santander who explained what was wrong. Yesterday I got a call from a lovely lady from complaints (Sally I think) as my problem had been registered. She apologised profusely for what was really quite a minor thing and easily rectified, and I have been credited £50 as a gesture of goodwill!

As I’d just had a not very rewarding hour on the phone unsuccessfully trying to get a refund from my energy supplier (who owe me hundreds) it really did lift my mood and brighten my day. Thank you Santander! People often only leave reviews when they are unhappy so I hope this redresses the balance a little. 😊

Santander randomly closed my business account and decided to send me the outstanding balance as a cheque even though i have never been in the red .
As i had a business linked to this account it made life extremely difficult .
I would never use this bank again as they didnt even have the decency to call me and let me know !

This is by far the worst bank I have ever had the misfortune of dealing with.
I've been stuck with Santander for three years after the RBS Switch, admittedly we received Payment incentives to move but in all honesty if I had my time again with the hassle of switching followed by the level of Service from Santander I would never have moved.
This is a diabolical Bank for Businesses.
No App if your Corporate, you can use your phone to authorise sign in's but only for one account, any other accounts and your stuck with ridiculous Security Tokens to authorise access online that is so backwards its untrue. (What year are we in?)
They've froze Business Accounts meaning we couldn't pay staff, they've refused payments from Customers because Business names don't match exactly even though they have the Business and Trading names assigned to the Accounts, its even happened when being paid from other Santander Accounts.
They've delayed Paperwork meaning property sales have almost fallen through, they've took Loan payments when the Loan has been paid off the list goes on!
Avoid at all Costs dreadful Bank that needs major changes or even taking over. I certainly will not be staying around to find out if they ever improve.

Don't contact Santander's complaints department. They'll just complain that you've done something wrong and make you feel bad.

I have been a Santander customer for 6 years now and if I had known about how difficult all their internal processes were I would have not chosen them. I work with 5 Banks nationally and internationally, it is shocking the time it takes to do simple things, ie: Adding a VIEW ONLY user to our accounts has taken 2 months, and by calling them to chase up on the matter just found out that remote workers are not able to be added to the account, therefore our account team is blocked out. (the process of course by post not digital) I would suggest checking their Business app feedback at the Apple Store. Very disappointed customer will move out asap.

We switched our ISAs to Santander from a Building Society. Although we initially visited the Waterlooville branch for advice and help, we arranged the transfers entirely online via Santander app. The application was done on Wednesday 26th October and were amazed that the transfer completed this morning. Already showing on the app, amazing. Branch staff were most helpful and obviously the Building Society responded quickly but we were told to expect the process to take up to 15 days. The Santander app is probably the best in our experience, very few bugs and glitches; very easy to use.
Santander have also generously given us double cashback (4%)on our energy bills for September and October. It's clear that there are very many negative or neutral reviews on Trustpilot but we have to give our opinions on their service for current accounts and savings, excellent service all round. Maybe others have difficult mortgage or insurance experiences but this does apply to us. As many people use Santander for current accounts and savings, we cannot understand why there are not more positive reviews. My wife and I are happy customers of Santander and have not been encouraged by Santander to give them a 5 Star review; for our part, they deserve it.

If I could score 0.5 I would!
Absolutely diabolical customer service! Due to complete on our property purchase today and Santander has decided to pull our file for an audit!
This isn't the half of the issues we've had with Santander mortgages and "head office!"
We have had nothing but trouble with the incompetence of multiple people so-called doing their job! Communication is the worst I've ever seen in my life (and I work for the NHS)! A huge complaint has already been raised because of 4 weeks of sheer incompetence. Then today adds the icing to the cake! We literally have just days left before our offer expires. We have days before we are homeless with a 13 year old despite being reassured time and time again over the last week that our funds will be released on the day of request or at the most 24hrs. We have been advised numerous times, by our complaint caseworker Ellie and a colleague of hers Michelle, that our case has been marked as a priority for funds to be released! I mean they've even paid us £100 compensation directly for their disgraceful handling of our case since August 22nd with multiple meaningless apologies. We were willing to give them the benefit of the doubt having never used them before. BIG MISTAKE!
Then BANG, they land us with this "head office audit," at the final hour today with nobody who can advise how long this will take and noway to chase this up? Really? So our case isn't the priority your incompetent employees assured us it was.
The ombudsman will be hearing about every single last issue we've had with Santander and every employee will be named and shamed (all 3-4 sides of A4 paper)!
I wonder how many of their incompetent employees or gross, greedy shareholders would put up with what we've been handed today? Oh yeah, that's right NONE!!
SERIOUSLY, run like Santander have the plague if anyone recommends them to you!! Do not touch them because it won't end well! Our dream is quickly turning into a nightmare and we are resigning ourselves to losing a house we've chosen to purchase all because of this unethical company.

Our mortgage advisor, who is completely independent, has today commented that she will never recommend Santander to anyone after what they've done to us since 22nd August.

We are now at very real risk of being homeless and our purchase falling through!
Bravo Santander. Pat yourselves on the back!

very bad service from Santander they closed my account without any clear information

Want a bank that's easy to work with, listens to your needs, wants to help your business, is quick to resolve issues and is just generally, you know, competent..? Then go elsewhere.

I've been a customer since 2015. I could write a long, moaning review about how, in that time, I've watched customer service go through the floor, but the details aren't important so I will save you the time reading. The icing on the cake just now was finally deciding to make a formal complaint, and waiting over 30 mins on hold only for them to just cut off the call.

Just take my word for it and go elsewhere, as I am about to suffer the faff of doing. Santander just don't want small businesses as customers any more, it's that simple.

Disgusting service, few months ago I was made a victim of a compromised scam and my card was blocked while I was paying for my shopping. They failed to inform me that with no calls until I made the call and Waited for 1 hour and the person on the phone didn't even have a clue and to what will happen next. I went to the bank to see it they can help me out but they told me to call customer service as it was on my record and I was not even told over the phone that time. Again waiting for 1 hour as per usual, the customer service assistant told me that they are not sure as to when the investigation team will get back to me. 2 months gone by that I could not use my card and instead I had to go to the bank to get my money and that was a long process as they had to email the security team for authorisation which they said it could take up to 2 hours. I then called the next day and asked what has happened with the scam however they told me that they are still under review and that I can open up a new account and have sent me a new card with the new account. I then made a decision to leave this bank and go to a new one, however this bank has rejected it due to the scam that they still failed to call me about. And again they have rejected it again with some errors and bullying me to pay them which I did. I was told that I will get a call back and its been 3 days nothing. I was then told that scam case they have closed without me knowing anything about it. Absolute disgarce as I have been their customer for almost 10 years. I am also going to be taking out few of my family members and going to Metro bank. DISGUSTING AND SHAMEFUL SERVICE.THIS BANK SHOULD BE CLOSED DOWN DUE TO THE NEGLECT THEY HAVE GIVEN ME ESPECIALLY DEMANDING MONEY FROM SOMEONE WHO IS SUFFERING FROM DEPRESSION!!!!.

After 15 years with Santander Business Bank I have been left disillusioned and totally frustrated by their abysmal customer service.
They blocked my account when I was trying to pay employees. The phone message sent to try to verify the transaction stated it didnt recognise the phone number I have used with them for 10+ years
I was holding yesterday for 40 minutes trying to speak to the security dept after 30 minutes waiting to speak to the initial response people so gave up. Over an hour of my time I will never get back!
This morning still waiting after 45 minutes for same security dept!!
Totally unacceptable for a business bank - if they are beefing up their security prevention methods resulting in more blocked accounts then STAFF UP ACCORDINGLY
They know they have a staffing issue as shown in other posts but have done nothing to sort it out. Don't Santander think business owners have better things to do with their time than spend hours waiting for your security dept to pick up their phone? Your business customers deserve better

After 40 minutes plus on the telephone trying to unblock my account etc etc, with no result finally wrote letter of complaint. A nice gentleman phoned me from the complaints department and explained, not enough staff, but made amends by giving me £30 for the inconvenience caused, What a Bank! I'll stick with em

Do not use Santander for business accounts, the system and processes are archaic, as you grow you need better, tried to add a new employee onto the account and now after 2 weeks still no access:
Require too much information and processes don;t allow quick turnaround, missed a piece of information they sent a letter so another 5 days lost. We use another bank system and access was granted in less than 10 minutes ??? Other old things about the system are problematic, you can;t search for transactions and you can only download 600 lines of transactions. Very very old school online business banking.