New Natwest Account For Serial Overdraft Offenders
Natwest is to launch a new account aimed at current account holders who regularly go into the red without having an agreed overdraft facility, for which they can be charged up to £38 each time. The new account will have a lower unauthorised ovedraft fee of £17, in exchange for a fixed monthly payment of £10.
Around 100,000 account holders will be contacted by the bank to see if they want to switch to this account, although a Natwest spokesman said that the move would not be forced onto anyone who didn’t want to pay the new charge.
Although switching to the account could potentially save customers up to £130 a year, such serial offenders would save even more by contacting their bank and arranging an authorised overdraft, and suspicions arise that the initiative is at least in part a reaction to growing criticism over current levels of overdraft charging.