A 91-year-old woman had her pension, benefits payments and bank access stopped after a banking error resulted in her being marked as dead.
Barclays closed the woman’s account after she informed the firm that her husband had died. The error meant the widow was cut off from her money for three months and lost her phone line and energy supply.
The woman asked for her late husband’s name to be removed from their joint account and replaced with that of her daughter who has third-party access to her account. However, the pensioner was instead marked as dead which meant her pension and benefits were returned to the Department for Work and Pensions and her direct debits were stopped.
The woman made two trips to her nearest Barclays branch and on both occasions, she was told by staff that she had been marked as deceased. The bank also refused to discuss the matter with her daughter since her third-party access had been revoked and the account closed.
The 91-year-old had received a pile of letters from companies and the council demanding payments after her energy supply and phoneline were cut off – “her only means of contacting the outside world”, according to her daughter.
The woman’s account was eventually reopened and her payments restored and backdated, according to The Guardian, but her daughter said her mother was left living off of £250 in cash. Her phone line and energy supply have also been restored.
A Barclays spokesperson said: “We apologise unreservedly for the distress and inconvenience this has caused to our loyal customer. We can confirm that the direct debits have been reinstated, the state pension payments have been received, the account has been amended into joint names and a gesture of goodwill for the disruption caused has been offered.”
The 91-year-old has been a Barclays customer for 65 years, but she is unable to cope with the automated menus on the customer service phone line.
Since the closure of her local branch, she has been forced to take two buses to the next town to withdraw money and manage her account, and the only available appointment to request the account change was at a branch 23 miles away.
The woman said she brought the required documents, but the bank refused to proceed with the requested name change because she could not recall her little-used pin number, and she was told to make another appointment when she had remembered her pin.
“My mother is a vulnerable 91-year-old woman who has been treated without any concern for her safety, no recognition of her age or mobility issues or banking preferences,” her daughter said.
James Daley, managing director of the campaign group Fairer Finance, said banks need to accommodate customers for whom face-to-face banking is essential and said a significant number of people don’t feel confident using internet, phones or ATMs.
Barclays announced the closure of 15 branches across the country in January, meaning over 100 banks are set to close this year.
NatWest also said it is closing 23 branches, and Lloyds Banking Group will shut 40 Halifax and Lloyds sites.
Lloyds said the number of customers visiting the branches it plans to close had dropped by 60 per cent on average in the past five years.
