NatWest: "and don't let the door hit you on the way out"

Dear Complaints Department:

I recently transferred the balance of my NatWest step account to another bank and believe one of your employees may have attempted to subvert this process.  A full two weeks after the scheduled account closure and transfer date (October 7) I contacted your friendly and helpful customer services department to ask where my money was. No one knew. The first time I called I was asked to wait half an hour for a return call. When after two hours no one called back I phoned again and was asked to wait up to five days for a return call. Two days later a friendly and apologetic customer service representative phoned to inform me that

somehow the balance in question had been transferred INTO ANOTHER NATWEST CUSTOMER'S ACCOUNT.

This has been corrected, and I am happily doing my business elsewhere.

But the big reason I left NatWest is that every time I have had to deal with your company someone has screwed up. From the wrong statements being sent to the border agency to your Swiss Cottage branch employees flatly lying and telling me I could only have an international student account to the Lewisham branch employees lying and saying I couldn't have an interim statement mailed to me in time to prevent me being deported, I've had nothing but incompetence, lies, laziness, and insults from your staff from day one.  But this goes well beyond unacceptable and into criminal territory. Had I not contacted your friendly and helpful call centre someone in your transfers department could very well have gotten away with stealing my every last cent.

Why did I have to go out of my way to save my money from your employees' incompetence or sticky fingers?

How did you manage to successfully transfer my direct debit to my new bank but flatly fail to transfer my actual money? Yeah, my phone bill that went unpaid because my new account was empty. I had to go in and fix that too.

How did you manage to screw not only me over like this, but also my fiancé when he transferred his own account out six months ago? Yeah, the same thing happened: his direct debits were transferred, and his money never showed up. He wound up walking out of the bank with six months' worth of pay cheques in cash because your employees couldn't figure out how to transfer the balance for two months after he signed a transfer-and-close order.

Your business model appears to be "screw over customers until they complain" and is sincerely in need of an overhaul. What is preventing you from doing things right the first time? Why do you employ idiots and/or criminals to handle sensitive data and currency?

To sum up, your company's failures and lies have caused me to:

:pay for an account I didn't want after a viable free alternative was refused

:pay fees for non-payment of direct debits to my local council, gas company, phone company, and HMRS

:nearly be deported for incorrect balance data

:fight to have my money restored after its apparent internal theft

I expect nothing less than a sincere apology written by a human being, though a promise to review your systemic failures in training and employee screening would not go amiss. I'm sharing this information with my MP, except more politely.  I am among your most dissatisfied customers, and think you should be ashamed of yourselves.