A Barclays customer has been left raging after their bank account was closed – with seemingly no explanation. The bank account holder has hit out after the account was shut by the banking giant, which is one of the biggest in the UK.
Ogmore Valley Male Voice Choir were stunned to discover their account with the major bank was closed with immediate effect and feared their power would be cut off. The choir had banked with Barclays with no issues for 40 years until the chairman was notified in October that three accounts had been closed.
The choir’s chairman, Peter Morgan, told This is Money last month: “We have no idea why Barclays bank has closed our accounts after having been regular customers for so long. They have left us in limbo and it has put ourselves and I’m sure many others in a difficult position.
READ MORE £5,000 warning issued to millions of UK households who are ‘middle-income’
“We don’t borrow and we have always been in credit – so why has it suddenly been closed?” Mr Morgan continued: “We are worried that our energy is going to be cut off because we don’t have access to our account to pay the bills. Our treasurer has spoken to Barclays, and they say that they are going to open new accounts for us, but it will be another seven days before that happens.
“We have probably close to £30,000 in the accounts which we use to keep this building of ours going, and they say they can’t just transfer it over. It has to be a completely new account. We think because we are a charity and we don’t pay fees, this could be part of the reason that they have suddenly closed us down.”
A Barclays spokesman says: “As part of our ongoing responsibility to help prevent financial crime, and to meet our regulatory obligations, we are required to keep up to date information regarding our customers’ business accounts and this includes community groups.
“We engage with our customers through a series of communications including by post, banners on our digitally active customers’ online and mobile banking as well as reminder SMS text messages and emails asking them to provide us with important information relating to their business account.
“These communications do include warnings of account closure. In cases where we do not receive a response with up-to-date account information, we will proceed with the application of card blocks and account restrictions, followed by warnings of possible final closure arrangements if issues remain unresolved.”
