Santander Consumer Bank Reviews 75

The account we opened with Santander Consumer Bank on April 29th is on May 17th still not activated.

It started badly. Due to a technical fault it was impossible to sign documents online. Received a 13 page contract by email which we had to sign and return. All 13 pages.

Santander received the necessary bank transfers but rejected them. We found this out from our Dutch bank. No explanation from Santander.

Customer service is terrible. Web form doesn’t work. Emails not answered for 11 days. 15 minutes waiting time on the telephone. Then no action. Left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.

After having opened several accounts in multiple countries in my life, I can say this is the single most incompetent bank I've ever dealt with. Together with my wife, we wasted several weeks trying to open an online savings account with them. First, their system didn't want to accept our application even though we had submitted it correctly multiple times. Then, they sent me the password to my account in an email that looked like scam (unencrypted, no letterhead, password highlighted in yellow). Finally, they just told me they couldn't do anything to open our account even though we had followed all steps as requested - the system kept rejecting our activation transfers and they couldn't let us finalise the procedure in person because they don't have physical offices.

In the end, I just opened an account with MeDirect, which took me less than an hour and we are happy now. BUT Santander is not giving up and they keep sending me reminders to finalise the account opening procedure, even though they themselves admitted they had been unable to do it for us. I have clicked 'unsubscribe' more than 5 times and also sent them several emails asking to finally stop spamming me but they are not giving up, so I had to block them on Gmail.

Avoid them at all cost - I can't imagine entrusting my life's savings to a company showing such a level of incompetence.