For many people 2009 was a disastrous year financially. No one was left untouched by the ongoing recession and things can surely never be the same again.

Bankers became almost a new swear word in the English dictionary as interest rates tumbled. Rows over bonuses escalated and businesses went to the wall on a daily basis. Survival was the name of the game and many Third Agers realised that their dreams of retiring at the conventional age were rapidly receding. Assets became liabilities, especially property and even now at the start of a new year there is an uncertain future for jobs, savings, investments and business.

Here at Third Age we are not going to claim to be financial experts. The popular advice is to seek the help of an independent financial consultant over your affairs, although even they haven’t had the best press recently.

What we will do is scour the media for features and items which we consider will be of most interest and allow you to make up your own mind.

Our first spot deals with the Faster Payments scheme, which is accused of being too slow!

Bank customers are being advised to move their accounts if their bank does not allow them to move money on the same day.

Some banks still take three days to move money electronically between accounts in different banks. The Payments Council, which gave the advice, says it is taking “a harder line” with these banks.

The Payments Council gave the advice on Radio 4’s Money Box programme after it revealed that one bank, Citibank, still did not offer faster payments to any personal customers.

Nationwide Building Society limited faster payments to a maximum amount of £10, one Nationwide customer told the programme.

“Approaching retirement we want to get the best rates for our savings. That means moving it around. But it goes out of your account on one day and three days later it appears in another account. So in reality we’ve lost three days interest.

“It grieves me that the banks can’t sort out something very simple. I feel I’m being cheated.”

Speaking on behalf of the Payments Council, Sandra Quinn said :”The Council is in complete sympathy with customers who are finding frustrations with their bank.

“If faster payments are important to you for running your current account move to a bank that does what you want. There are banks that do.”

But she stressed that several banks have fully implemented the new system and three quarters of online payments go through it.

Faster Payments was launched in May 2008 after years of complaints from customers that online payments left their account instantly but did not appear at their destination for three days or more.

Many banks failed to meet the original deadline of implementing the new system by the end of 2008. Nine months later, in October 2009, the council told all its members that it expected them all to allow same day payment of at least £1000.

But three months after that Money Box discovered that Citibank, one of the founding members of the Faster Payments system, did not allow any of its personal customers to make instant transfers.

Several others impose lower limits ranging from £500 at Clydesdale and Yorkshire Bank, £250 for customers of Abbey, Alliance & Leicester, and Co-operative Bank and just £10 for Nationwide.

A Citibank spokeswoman told the programme it too hopes to offer the service by April 2010, and blamed fraud prevention for the delays.

“We are starting to roll it out in the second quarter for some personal account holders. It is a priority,” she said.

A spokesman for Nationwide said the building society was “working hard to improve its faster payment offering”, but added it was being “careful and cautious” about implementing it fully to ensure that the risk of fraud is reduced.

Editor, Third Age.