Conflicting advice on cheque clearance timescales!

  • sharon247's Avatar
    Hi,Like many of the other posters, I am going through my own nightmare. I had a cheque to deposit in store so made enquiries. I was told 4 working days after receipt. Instore I confirmed this & was also told it wouldn't matter if I deposited it in my Current a/c or my Instant Access Savings. I chose the savings. Cheque showed in my a/c the day after (phew!) - I counted this as day 1 for clearance. Today is day 5 so phoned Tesco. They checked for me, couldn't confirm when was day 1 but it will take 7 -10 working days to clear! Why is there so much misleading advice? My cheque was written by another bank. I was asked to provide proof of funds (fraud prevention) & showed them the a/c withdrawl from my passbook, they photocopied my passbook & drivers licence to deposit! I searched for cheque clearance times on the Tesco site & you don't the product match of this is how the account works, you get this forum & within this forum there is anything from 4 days, 6 days & longer! Extremely disappointed & just waiting to see what happens now. Not a dynamic I want with my bank, should have stuck with the late night milk from Tesco. Seriously lost credibility with me now.
  • 2 Replies

  • sharon247's Avatar
    I should also ad - during today's call I was advised that as Tesco can't do anything about the misquoted clearance times, the only thing I could do is to contact the issuing bank to see if they can stop the cheque payment. If so, then I could take their fees to the Tesco store that I deposited the cheque to 'see' if they'll reimburse me.... The store had no idea how to process the cheque hence my photocopied ID & almost a 45 minute wait while they tried to reach someone on the phone at Tesco to tell them what to do. Took them that long to reach someone - they were on hold. I then start the ordeal of 'seeing' if they'll reimburse me. Perfect. That's if it can be stopped. Means a special trip into central London to collect the replacement cheque/ afternoon off work. I deposited another cheque by same issuer into an alternate bank same day as Tesco. Cleared on the 3rd business day.
  • ScottW's Avatar
    Employee
    Hi @sharon247, I'm really sorry to read about the problems you've had paying this cheque into your account. It should take ten working days for a cheque to clear into one of our savings accounts once we recieve the cheque from our store. The stores sometimes send the cheques in batches, so on occasion they may wait a day or so before they post them to us. I'm sorry if this wasn't made clear when you asked to deposit your cheque.

    If the cheque hasn't cleared within this timescale, then we would need to speak with you to investigate this further and also look into covering any fees or charges that may be involved with the cancellation process. If you call our team on 0345 678 5678, available 8am - 10pm on weekdays and 9am - 5pm at the weekend, they can look over everything that's happened and help get this sorted for you.