NZ Banks - Looking for recommendation
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<p>I've been with ASB since uni, spent some time with TSB also who do very good deals but have fewer branches (not a problem these days, who goes into the branch?) and their service was good but I decided to consolidate and picked the bank with more branches</p>
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<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="canefan" data-cid="603960" data-time="1470614862">
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<p>Well they are one in the same...</p>
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<p>Back then National was still part of Lloyds if I remember correctly. ANZ Purchased them in the 2000's?</p> -
<p>yeah think it was mid-2000s and then more recently they did away with the National branding altogether (they were no longer allowed to use the Horse)</p>
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<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="taniwharugby" data-cid="603968" data-time="1470617085"><p>
yeah think it was mid-2000s and then more recently they did away with the National branding altogether (they were no longer allowed to use the Horse)</p></blockquote>u<br><br>
Didn't it die? The ex used to ride one of foals and it got turned into dog tucker when we were together . She was distraught even though she hadn't seen the bloody thing in years. I didn't cheer her up much/at all when I told her about my stepsister turning up to her horse riding club to find her favourite nag was nowhere to be seen and when she asked where it was the old dragon who ran the place took her to the shed where they kept the freezer and opened the lid and said " here it is". -
<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Hooroo" data-cid="603978" data-time="1470618209"><p>
He means the Logo not the actually horse on the advert!</p></blockquote>
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Ah, that makes sense .in not sure a horse rearing up to stomp the shit out of you is a good logo anyway but quite fitting in my experience with them. -
<p>ANZ screwed me when at university. They gave me a free overdraft which I didn't want and didn't request. So I called them up and got it cancelled, as said there was no need. All fine and dandy.</p>
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<p>Then one day, I got some money out which put it into OD. I didn't check the balance, as I just assumed it would have declined if going OD. Instead gave me the cash, but then charged me $100 to go into OD which I didn't have authorised.</p>
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<p>They refused to budge on their stance when I told them what happened. So I killed the account, paid the fine and walked away.</p>
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<p>About 6 years later I was getting an offshore mortgage and they came flying in. I took about 5 meetings, and wasted hours and hours of time on documentation / applications etc. Anyway, they offered me the mortgage finally, so I wrote a letter explaining what had happened earlier and how much I enjoyed using well over $100 of their resources during the application process, for a mortgage which I never had any intent on signing up for.</p>
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<p>Totally pathetic on my part. But I enjoyed it.</p> -
<p>Westpac did that to me one time in my teens, fortunately I played golf with one of the guys there and he got it all sorted, despite the women at the service desk playing hardball (unsure if this was the rules or that I used to date her daughter....)</p>
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<p>I should actually add that in hindsight, this wasn't really a problem with the company, just more the local bank manager as a person who flatly refused to look at the situation for what it was.</p>
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<p>If they offered a good package/service now, I'd be more than happy to use them.</p> -
<p>We use ASB at the moment, but have previously used National Bank and then ANZ by default after the merger. </p>
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<p>We found the product that ANZ offered was good, but their staff and systems bordered on incompetent. Despite having around 600k of lending, we didn't qualify for a personal banker, so whenever we needed something done, we had to call and arrange for the paperwork to be sent to a branch for us to go in and sign or whatever. The problem with this was, about 60 percent of the time when we turned up to sign the branch the paperwork wasn't there or, wasn't the right thing, or they had no idea who we were or what we were there for. Then when we went to buy our most recent house in Auckland, with my parents as limited guarantors, they tried to demand 2 years worth of accounts for my parents businesses, despite them being able to show they were financially stable enough with term deposits that they could easily bail us out if it came to it. In the end we walked away from ANZ for that very reason. As with MajorRage, about two months after we left, I started getting phone calls every few weeks asking if we wanted to come back. </p>
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<p>We now have our accounts with ASB and have our own personal banker. She is awesome, and even though we're overseas, everything is easily sorted by emails. ASB smashed us with break fees when we sold our rental property late last year and wouldn't budge on them, but that was more our own fault for making a stupid long term interest rate choice a few years back. The only grievance I have with ASB is that we still pay account fees on our revolving credit, despite having a reasonable amount of lending with them, and therefore paying a small fortune in interest each month anyway.</p> -
<p>Is anyone with BNZ? That is who I am with and I thikn they Suck! I was happy at National Bank and then it merged with ANZ and for me, they fell to pieces with customer service so I didn't mind popping to BNZ. Now ANZ look fantastic in comparison.</p>
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<p>I might go and have a chat with ASB.</p>
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<p>I run a few horse accounts through Westpac and they must be 20 years behind with their technology????</p> -
<p>Might be some useful advice here too (not trying to be a dick about there being a recent topic - just genuinely thought this might be helpful)</p>
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<p><a data-ipb='nomediaparse' href='http://www.daimenhutchison.com/rugby/index.php/topic/42058-banking-nonsense/'>http://www.daimenhutchison.com/rugby/index.php/topic/42058-banking-nonsense/</a></p> -
<p>We have our mortgage with ASB and bank with Kiwibank, and I put my self-employed banking through Westpac. All are fine these days in my experience.</p>
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<p>That said, the smaller banks (think Cooperative, Heartland, SBS, TSB etc) will be more willing to do more for you as their best chance of differentiation from the big banks is service.</p>
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<p>Also, some banks offer discounted fees etc to employees of some businesses e.g. Westpac has cheaper banking for public servants, Kiwibank has cheaper banking for most union members.</p> -
<p>I've always found ASB very good to deal with although I did just have a minor issue with them recently despite living in the UK.</p>
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<p>I think the worst bank in NZ will be miles better than any in the UK. Absolutely shocking over here - I had a battle on my hands just to open an account!</p> -
<p>As I went to the UK on a working holiday (whereas you are on a UK Passport aren't you?) I had to open an account before I left as part of the visa condition was to show I had £2000 available to me, the travel agent sorted it all for me, was easy as!</p>
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I just remembered why I stuck with bnz , when I was in Sydney the ATM swallowed my card leaving me with bugger all money and I'd only been there a week. I rang bnz in NZ and told them what happened and they sent me a replacement card that day , because I was staying at a backpackers I didn't want my credit card being sent there so I gave them the address of the Westpac branch I'd joined up at the day before and told them to make attn my personal banker. It turned up the next day , when I got the card off her she was blown away that a bank would actually go to that sort of trouble for a customer.
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<p>I've had accounts with Westpac, National Bank, ANZ and BNZ.</p>
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<p>By a country mile (in my experience) the worst is ANZ. As others have said above they are very keen to send any kind of debt straight to the creditors without really informing you, whereas the other banks will actually make an effort to contact you and work out a repayment.</p>