Barclays Accused by Customers in Greece of Closing Accounts Withholding their Money

Barclays Bank in the UK has closed the accounts of non-UK residents following Brexit and is now dragging its feet in returning the money to their rightful owners, customers in Greece allege.

There are at least two cases of Greek citizens who have raised the issue. One person wrote to the Guardian.

A Greek citizen writing to the Guardian from Axioupoli in northern Greece with the initials AR said:“I have had a Barclays bank account for 27 years and kept it when I moved to Greece but, after Brexit, it decided to close accounts held by non-UK residents.“I have never received a letter from Barclays about this but, in September, I found I could no longer log in to my account which contained nearly £50,000.Grecian Delight supports Greece“When I contacted Barclays, I was told it had been closed and it advised me to make a reclaim request for my money to be transferred to my Greek bank account.I did this online on 14 September. I also filled in the account closing instructions form and uploaded all the documents it asked for.I was then sent a “claim submission number” informing me that it would process it within 10 working days of receiving my documents.However, more than a month has passed and my funds have still not arrived. I have repeatedly called Barclays to find out what has gone wrong, but no one can tell me. What has happened to my money?”

Barclays says it contacted customers six months before account closure.

Barclays has set up a dedicated website for customers who might be affected by the closure of accounts held by non-UK residents.

It claims that when it makes the decision to no longer offer products and services, “we are contacting impacted customers to give them six months’ notice of this decision and outline the next steps they need to take.”

The Guardian notes that it’s hard not to conclude that Barclays has not put enough effort into managing these closures. “Sending letters and then closing accounts – even when no reply comes from the account holder – does not seem good enough when large sums of money are at stake.

There are other ways to reach customers, especially those living abroad, in the 21st century,” the Guardian says.