As week thirty four of the Bounce Back Loan scheme included Christmas Day, I decided to tweet less to give everyone a chance to take a break from the ongoing sagas associated with the scheme.
That week by the way covered the days from and including the 21st of December through to the 27th of December 2020. Most lenders had given their staff time off during that week so there were no major updates to announce.
The video below shows a few of the messages and tweets I was sent during that week:
Below you will see an overview of anything that did happen of interest and an insight into the many ongoing problems that were still being experienced throughout week thirty four of the Bounce Back Loan scheme.
The never ending delays with HSBC top ups continued during Christmas week, those who contacted the CEO team were emailed and promised their complaints would be looked into during mid to latter part of January 2021, which shows you just how many complaints that team were receiving for top ups.
A few people did finally get paid out a Bounce Back Loan this week just in time for Christmas, at least those that did had finally ended their journey for a loan, even though it had taken many months for some of them to finally get one.
I did hear the usual stories of some banks closing down accounts of those they had paid out Bounce Back Loans to weeks or months previously, lenders were obviously checking the shared industry database to see if those requesting a top up had another BBL and if so, they would find their request for a top up denied and their bank accounts would be locked if that database had them listed as having another BBL with another lender.
Keep in mind that database did not go fully operational until June, so many requesting a top up who had applied and got their BBL during May and mid-June were at risk of having their top up request denied and even their bank accounts locked if that database had them listed as having a BBL with another bank for the same business entity, but keep in mind that database was riddled with errors as proved beyond any doubt.
That in turn meant some people who may have only applied for a feeder account with HSBC but never got one, were on the Tide or Starling waiting list and never got a BBL with those three banks but got one with another could have seen their top up request denied and even their bank accounts locked due to errors on that database or bank staff reading the information contained on it erroneously.
