PTSB vs. BOI: How do their online services & phone apps compare?

No Pants

I'm seriously considering moving our joint account from BOI to PTSB. I've never done this in Ireland, but I have moved accounts in England before and it was easy enough, but it's almost a decade ago at this point.

One thing that I do need to consider is PTSB's online service and their phone app. Do they have one? What's the functionality like? I don't do too much on there, but I do like being able to set up a new payee fairly easily and to transfer money around whenever I feel like it. Will I still be able to do this with PTSB?

Vologda69

I used BOI for 17 years. Switched to PTSB few months ago. I find their online banking and app to be excellent. BOI online banking could sometimes be a pain to find what you were looking for (e.g. Topping up phone credit). Nothing on BOI that I can't do on PTSB. I much prefer the slimmed down appearance on PTSB site abd app. Seems to be faster too.

Poochie05

I was BOI customer for over 25 years and moved to PTSB last month. Their online system seems to do everything BOI system does, and the app is great to. No issues so far. Some areas are a little clunky but nothing that would put you off. Setting up payees can be done in 5 minutes with the confirmation code sent by text, I set up a few of these over the weekend.

If you do go ahead and switch, one piece of advice I would give you is to give any of the companies you have Direct Debits with a call yourself once you have your new account details as although PTSB switch over all of them, I had an issue with them not being updated soon enough in the receiving companies' systems so I ended up having to follow them all up once I noticed bills weren't being paid. But even that wasn't a huge hassle.

Another tip would be to transfer some money yourself to your new account before the actual switch starts. It takes 7 working days from your switch date until the switch is completed and they recommend to stop using your debit card for your closing account so as not to have pending transactions which would make your old bank refuse the switch and you'd have to start the process again.

But what I did to avoid this was transfer some money manually from my closing account to my new PTSB account a few days before the switch date and just started using the new PTSB one instead. You should get your debit card a week or 2 before the switch date so I had time to activate it, change the pin and set up online banking well in time before the switch date, avoiding the issue of not being able to use your old card.

Bob24

Thanks guys, good to have feedback from their customers before switching.

One more question: can the website and the app be used to transfer money to a bank account outside of Ireland? (BOI's website works great for doing that, but their app can't do it)

AlmightyCushion

Bob24 wrote: »

Thanks guys, good to have feedback from their customers before switching.

One more question: can the website and the app be used to transfer money to a bank account outside of Ireland? (BOI's website works great for doing that, but their app can't do it)

You have to add the account on the main website but once you do that you should have no issues transferring to it in the app.

Bob24

Good to hear, thanks!