National Savings Finally See The Light!

[FinancialSpecialist]

I do hope you signed both up for Life Insurance?

Predictable

[billyhayes]

I do hope you signed both up for Life Insurance?

Predictable

Ah, but if you didn't then you are one s**t FS.

Oh yeah, I went there...

[BELIAL]

I have never had anything to do with sub offices, it is true. That aside, I know it may seem overly optimistic and I can understand the fear that this headline has brought.

However, in my view the NS&I range isn't as strong as the PO range, obviously with the exception of the Index Linked Savings Certificates. If you own a sub post office and do not try to cross sell Post Office savings to National Savings Customers who bring in their old tattered passbooks to add to their Investment accounts while earning 0.2%, when similar PO products offer up to 2.75%, and bonds which vary, then you are missing a trick. The Post Office range of savings is quite often better for the customer, offers higher income levels for the branch and means that the customer will do their interacting each week with the Post Office, and not with NS&I through the Post Office.

Yes there are lots of customers who want to deal with National Savings because they always have done, or because their parents and grandparents did before them, but the majority see the association between Post Office and NS&I as so great that they don't see the difference. As an FS when I ask customers if they have saved with the PO before, they will invariably say "yes my parents opened an account a National Savings account for me when I was a child" or something along those lines.

In 2011 customers still associate the Post Office with NS&I and they still will do in 2021. The customers who stick with the traditional providers do not like going on the phone or online to ask a question and will still come to their local Post Office for help. As we will still stock the forms we will be able to still offer limited help and of course offer a product range which we can help them with further.

In my office we have dealt with many customers who are from out of town, who when presented with the Post Office range of savings are actually annoyed that their local office never mentioned to them that they could be getting higher interest on their accounts and wouldn't have to send a passbook away for withdrawals. Also, we have been getting customers coming to our branch to open Growth Bonds with old Issue 13 application packs which have been out of date for some time and the system will not even scan. The only reason they got these packs is because they went to their local office to ask for the forms and were then told to bring them to our crown office to open them. I do not know whether the reason behind this is fearing the consequences of making mistakes or just not thinking much of the Post Office products, but if this is the case then I could see why some offices are worried about losing the NS&I business.

Obviously each office is different and each set of customers is different, but I honestly think that the removal of NS&I from Post Office could present as many opportunities as it takes away. Post Office is a respected brand for savings and is now the 8th biggest provider of savings products in the UK, we don't have the necessity of NS&I business that we originally did.

Not a clue what gives them away

[FinancialSpecialist]

I do hope you signed both up for Life Insurance?

Predictable

Ah, but if you didn't then you are one s**t FS.

Oh yeah, I went there...

There is still time ;) In the time I have posted on here when I write negatively about something I get applauded for speaking the truth, and when I speak in favour of anything I get slagged for being "one of them" or a jokey answer is given instead of any intelligent thought. Is no one here capable of debate?

I should maybe just join in - Down with the Post Office, everything's s**t these days can't wait to see the look on (insert manager's name here)'s face when I am picking up my VR. Targets are bollocks, things were better in the old days when we didn't have computers. Everything should just stay the same forever and ever and ever. Children have no respect these days, our customers smell of piss, foreigners are ruining the country. Yawn.

[billyhayes]

Hmm, that last bit smacks of the real you.

Just 'joining in' or is the real bigot in you rearing its ugly head?

And not all customers smell of piss. TCP is quite a popular scent.

You remind me of someone... Jonathan Cook.

[The BFO]

I do hope you signed both up for Life Insurance?

Predictable

Indeed - you could have taken up on the light hearted spirit and responded in similar vein...

[kathleen1]

Hmm, that last bit smacks of the real you.

Just 'joining in' or is the real bigot in you rearing its ugly head?

And not all customers smell of piss. TCP is quite a popular scent.

You remind me of someone... Jonathan Cook.

Don't be negative Billy, I like the smell of p!ss it gives me positive thinking when I am selling sh*t all day long.
I have a very strong feeling December is going to be a very long month. HO, HO, HO.

[PostalOfficer]

It's not very often I get near agreeing with FinancialSpecialist, but compared with it's heyday NS&I transactions are a tiny fraction of what they used to be, mainly because of pathetic interest rates.

There seem to be a lot of products with a confusing system of what we can do at the counter, what forms we stock which we are asked about infrequently. On the basis that they are becoming 'nuisance value' as my old boss called it, good riddance.

It's is rather obvious that any remaining Investment Accounts should be upgraded (poached?) to Instant Saver, except for the fact that many of our customer have less than £500 to put in. Now would be the ideal time for BOI to bring out a simple savings account with a low minimum. I suspect as usual they will wait till all the customers have left and bring it out in 12 months time, then berate the frontline staff for not selling enough of them.

Also, compare the comments about us becoming the front end of government with the loss of green giros and NS&I.