Can I ask why you have Beef with Santander?
This is the old fact sheet
Itās completely changed!
Theyāre as legacy as they come. And arenāt much better than Co-op in their processes.
I never liked using them as a customer years ago. The customer experience is a super frustrating one.
And the onboarding when I went to rejoin for the switch bribe last year was atrocious. By far the worst of any bank (even compared to co-op).
And like co-op, they cocked everything up. So I could never actually log in to online banking or the app. Nor did I get the switching bonus because of it. Switched it back into RBS afterwards. Never again.
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They have their own technology (more limited than Santander, but Santander withdrew their messaging service and Cater Allen still has it, so thatās not all bad) and own banking licence, but yes - they are effectively Santander under the hood. Service is entirely separate though.
Although I donāt find Santander too bad myself, perhaps their reputation from years ago (when they were worse, as I understand it) continues to plague them.
A long time ago, Cater Allen used RBS as their partner bank, but after Santander bought Abbey National (they owned Cater Allen) it was eventually all brought under Santanderās backend. The legacy of that is presumably why they use a sort code which is otherwise in the RBS England range.
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Just learnt they have No Apple Pay!!!
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oh dear god
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Iāve been using them for years and have never had a single issue with them. Iāve had to call them once and they were really helpful. Iāve never stepped foot in one of their branches either. Theyāve also been adding in new features to their current app recently, with a new app also being piloted. Iāve switched around many banks (with accounts that arenāt Santander), and am happy to stay with Santander.
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Just to point out, in case somebody is skim-reading this: Cater Allen themselves still have no app.
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Oh yeah. I have the Santander Pilot App! I like the new app design
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Definitely looks modern modern and fresh compared with their old app.
I know!!!
Thatās the big issue with it for me.
But I guess I can save the login via Firefox for a quick login.
Just bye bye FaceID
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Soā¦ no app, no Apple Pay? Just online banking?
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Yaah
I guess you could use Curve?
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Just online banking, online banking in a cut-down mobile web-view, and telephone.
They are old-school!
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Who knows, they opened up to letting more people in maybe they are gonna do moreā¦
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Although it does seem you can add the account to the new Santander app with open banking so you can at least see how much money you have in the account and recent transactions (do other banks allow Cater Allen with open banking. It isnāt one I remember seeing, but I didnāt really pay too much attention)?
Itās obviously not the same as having their own app, but better than nothing.
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Yes you can!
They are also available in Lloyds Banking Group apps as an integration (Lloyds Bank, Halifax, Bank of Scotland).
The Open Banking situation with Cater Allen is that they do have fully-compliant APIs available for use, but since they are such a small bank there is often a lack of interest in bothering to integrate them from aggregators and other Open Banking apps.
Santander obviously did it because it was to support the wider Group. Most other providers donāt have the same overriding consideration, so I wouldnāt hold your breath.
I have created my own āappā using the iOS Shortcuts app to package the webview, which is OK but login is clunky.
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Santander obviously did it because it was to support the wider Group. Most other providers donāt have the same overriding consideration, so I wouldnāt hold your breath.
Although looking at the older app, it doesnāt look like it was possible. Theyāve clearly decided it was now worth adding Cater Allen when designing the new app for whatever reason.
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