Not upheld: service failure and delays in fund transfer complaint against Barclays Bank UK PLC

Decision detail

Summary

X complained to Barclays about delays and service issues when attempting to transfer £231.36 from her closed cash ISA to an external ISA held with provider H. Barclays processed the transfer on 26 June 2025, but the funds were returned by H on 8 July 2025 for unclear reasons. Barclays did not uphold the complaint, stating it had processed the payment correctly and offered to resend the funds once the issue with H was clarified or with alternative account details. The ombudsman agreed with Barclays, finding no evidence of error or unfair treatment on Barclays' part and determining that the issues stemmed from H's internal processes rather than Barclays' actions.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman found that Barclays correctly processed the transfer instruction as requested and had no control over how the recipient bank H handled incoming transfers. The return of funds was not attributable to any error or unfair treatment by Barclays but rather to H's internal processes. Barclays' offer to resend funds once the issue was resolved or with alternative account details demonstrated it had not done anything wrong.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website