Nationwide improves its online banking facilities

After launching its online mortgage application in November 2006, Nationwide are now enabling their credit card customers to:

• Request increases to their credit limits and receive instant decisions (on condition they are eligible in the first place.)
• Order replacement cards if theirs becomes damaged.
• Request a PIN reminder.
• Either change the amount paid by monthly direct debit, or, be able to download a mandate in order to set a new one up.

Nationwide’s credit card customers are allowed the freedom of setting their own monthly direct debit payment amount, enabling them to decide just how much they wish to pay towards their credit card statement each month. It is not a common practise, but Nationwide does not insist its customers repay the full balance or a fixed minimum amount monthly.

When changing credit limits online, card holders can use the online  calculators thus giving the customer the ability to manage their budget themselves and choose a repayment option which  best suits their own personal circumstances.

Another option available to Nationwide customers is to go paper free and receive all statements online. It cuts out paper statements, which in turn helps the environment. To use this facility, customers would be e-mailed once their latest statement is ready to be viewed online. Nationwide estimate that if ALL their customers cancelled paper statements, then that would make a saving of 40million sheets of paper in just one year.

The ‘paper free’ option has been available to those customers holding a Nationwide FlexAccount and card based savings accounts since June2005, and to date over 200,000 customers have gone down this route.

Customers using Nationwide’s Internet Banking site can view 27months’ of statements at one time. They are laid out just the same as the paper statements and you can easily store them or print them off if required.

Nationwide openly try to help the environment and a divisional director confirms they have used recycled paper on all their literature and statements for 3years or more and encourage their customers to do what they can to help.