Santander Consumer UK plc Anmeldelser 280

Very unhelpful, they argument with you on the phone and they say that they tried to call you several times,they not calling you or email you and when you calling them not respond back straight away, takes like an hour sometimes and they never call you back for help or advise. Do not be happy for 9.2% APR as if you ever miss a payment they send the hall agreement to a recovery company which cost around £300 fee + the interest after is very high because they want some money from them as well and the recovery company is putting them interest as well. So if you ever encounter for a loan with Santander Consumer Finance, say stop or just go through another company.

I handed my pcp car back at the end of a 2 year contract in perfect condition in September having paid on time with every payment.
Santander then sold the car at auction to a dealer in Canvey Island a month ago.
Today, 18th November I received 2 letters
1 Saying that I have missed a payment for November ? (Contract ended in September)
2. That I must pay the balloon payment of £19k+ within 10 days or court proceedings will start against me.
I spoke on telephone after a long wait and the guy confirmed that they had the car back in perfect condition and all payments made on time and should just ignore the letters.
What sort of company is this?
I will escalate this
to the Financial ombudsman if I do not get a written confirmation and apology within 7 days.

I am writing this because I feel utterly failed, ignored, and mistreated by Santander. What I have experienced over the past year and a half is unacceptable from any company — let alone a major financial institution.

Santander has shown me a complete lack of care, responsibility, and professionalism, and I want other customers to be aware of how badly things can go wrong when you need support.

I financed a car through Santander that turned out to be dangerously faulty from almost the start. It suffered repeated breakdowns, multiple oil issues, and eventually required a full engine replacement — a clear indication it was never fit for purpose.

Despite this, Santander refused to take my situation seriously.

I raised multiple complaints over the year, each with new information and evidence, but Santander repeatedly:
- Marked them as “duplicates”
- Ignored new facts
- Refused escalation
- Failed to provide any senior contact

It is impossible to resolve anything when the finance provider won’t even acknowledge what is happening.

When I turned to the Financial Ombudsman — as Santander themselves told me to — Santander then advised the Ombudsman not to take on my case.

I was stunned! I had nowhere left to turn, no internal support, and my vehicle was unsafe and unusable.

Despite all the above and the fact that we had an open case with the Ombudsman, Santander still went ahead with their proceedings against me and issued me with a 'Default Notice', even though:
- The car was unroadworthy
- I had been updating them constantly
- I was actively trying to resolve the situation

I still paid the arrears by their deadline — yet they still went ahead and issued a 'Termination Notice' the very next month. This felt completely unjustified and deeply stressful.

At no point did Santander show any concern that I:
- Broke down multiple times with my three children
- Experienced a 10-hour tow across the country
- Returned the car to the dealer because it was unsafe
- Nearly lost work due to lack of transport
- Was left without any support for months

Not once did they acknowledge the emotional or financial toll!

The way Santander has handled my case shows a shocking lack of accountability. I followed every process, provided every document, gave every update — yet I’ve been treated as though my situation doesn’t matter.

I am now forced to continue escalating because I refuse to be ignored any longer.

If you ever run into a serious issue with your financed vehicle, be prepared to face:

- Delayed responses
- Dismissed complaints
- No escalation options
- Incorrect investigation reports
- Aggressive account action
- A complete lack of empathy

This has been one of the most stressful experiences of my life, and it is still ongoing.

I cannot recommend Santander based on the way I have been treated. No customer deserves to go through what I have endured and unfortunately still am enduring!

And just to add, today I have found out that my vehicle was repossessed on the 9th of October based on the dealership claiming it was “abandoned,” despite the fact that I was towed to them in July after a 10-hour ordeal with my three young children. I am still awaiting the dealership’s independent investigation report. The vehicle was still under contract, I was still making payments, and by law Santander required my permission or a court order — which they did not have. They are now telling me I will be charged £70 for the tow, and to make matters worse, they were pressuring me only last week to give permission for them to take the car, even though they had already had it in their possession for over a month despite not informing me. The negative impact on my health is growing by the day. This entire experience with such a large, worldwide company has been unbelievable. Do not deal with them at all costs.

Worsted company in history as they tell you one thing and change what they say because they want your money and I called so many times and they make rescues to make you keep paying them so they don't think about customers so please avoid at all cost as they lie.

Embarrassment of a company. Ordered a Tesla and Santander’s system was “down” for 3 weeks. Kept being told it would be fixed on 6 occasions and in the end I switched to Lex Autolease which was done in 10 minutes! If their IT staff worked for me they would all be fired! Stay clear. I’ve informed everyone on Facebook to switch and people are daily! Their loss!

Reviewing here in hope that I can get a reply as my emails are ignored. Santander dealt with my case, then have promptly closed it, before the repairs were actually carried out.

Cinch, after previously authorising all the repair work, have now withdrawn it all, yet refuse to give me any evidence or data supporting their decision, telling me to 'get it from the garage'.

The dealership have confirmed that they haven't got records of this data or sent any evidence of this kind, to Cinch. Yet no one from Santander will return my emails - please reopen my case.

I have continued paying my finance agreement for my undriveable SORN car, as you told me I had to. I have been without a car for 3 months, unable to drive my disabled child to school as I have no other car in the household and cannot afford a hire car due to having to continue paying you, despite the car being 'dangerous to drive' . I have done everything in good faith and through the proper channels, please contact me.

Complete shambles of a company. Handed back my car at the end of my PCP agreement after multiple hours long phone calls to get them to collect it. No one who I talked could arrange pickup or give me a contact number of anyone who could.
Once I had handed it back was sent a default demand despite having paid agreement and mileage excess in full. Rang to be told it had been sent by mistake and to ignore. Then received a letter confirming account had been closed and fully paid. Then a few days later another letter threatening default again. Absolute joke of a company, do not ever consider using for car finance.

Probably the worst company I’ve used for personal contract hire. Largely due to their customer services, laden with arbitrary rules such as ‘we will respond in 48 hours’ and ‘this will require 10 days advance notice’.

The latest in a long line of terrible interactions is trying to return a vehicle earlier than the contract end date. They require your agreement number to interact with them, however if you are a personal lease customer via a third party, you are never issued this. So getting through to customer services to sort this is a 50 minute wait on hold. Only to then be told settlement quotes can only be requested by email. So you email, only to be asked your agreement number. You explain that customer services don’t give out this number they eventually accept the registration number. You wait several days and a settlement quote comes through. You email back to accept the quote. Once you accept a settlement quote, you must wait 10 working days before the vehicle can be collected. However, a settlement quote itself is only valid for a few weeks, meaning there is a tiny finite period which, provided Santander don’t need to ask further questions (because as you’ll remember, each email needs 48 hours for a response), you can respond to accept a quote. I’m stuck in this window currently. I accepted a quote but after various back and forth emails, the quote expired (I gave 12 days notice, it because they need 10 working days notice they could not accept my instruction). So I needed to get a new quote. After which the 10 day notice period before collection can be arranged resets. All in all I think it’ll be around 20 calendar days from my original acceptance to the point the vehicle is actually collected. I’m hoping this time my acceptance of the quote goes through without further query. All in all, this back and forth has cost me an extra £300 as instead of paying 50% of outstanding rentals, I’ve been charged an extra month at full price along with needing to add temporary insurance to cover the unexpected additional period. Which is useless to me as the vehicle is surplus to requirements so it’s essentially £300 spent with no benefit whatsoever. I’ve emailed again to contest this, so will no doubt hear back in 48 hours - possibly in time this time I hope for the early settlement to be accepted and I can finally return the vehicle.

All very frustrating and entirely of Santander’s making due to their arbitrary, conflicting rules and ridiculous made up timelines. All of this potentially creates more work for Santander workers - in my case I’ve had two quotes and still haven’t successfully managed to return the vehicle. If they are doing everything twice for all of their customers, no wonder it takes so long to get a reply from anyone.

My advice - there are many finance houses out there and having used quite a few over the years, Santander is the only one I’ve had these issues with. So my advice is essentially use anyone else, whoever you choose will be without question be better than Santander.

Still on hold.... 44 minutes so far, they close in 15 minutes, don't like my chances of getting an answer!

Can’t give them a mark of zero.Never deal with them again.

Hard to remember dealing with a worse organisation. I returned my car to them under the terms of a PCP agreement back in July and they are still trying to collect money. I've been threatened with a default notice, which is laughable! Fortunately I cancelled the DD when I handed back the car or I can't imagine the mess I'd be trying to unpick. As I type, I've been on the phone for 50 minutes waiting for someone to answer so as I can try to get to the bottom of the latest demand for money.

Yes, it takes ages to get through to speak to anyone (I waited an hour, thankfully 0800 freephone!)

But once through, I was dealt with by a friendly chap called Gabriel who answered every question and resolved all of my issues.

Clearly this call centre is getting hammered due to lack of staff - but persevere, you will eventually get through and be dealt with properly...

My finance agreement was finished in July 2025 i have so far received 10 letters from them demanding further payment and why did i stop the direct debit then they wanted to refund a payment i tried calling waiting on the telephone 45 minutes 3 times still no answer finally emailed a complaint received apology then stated i would get a letter stating my account was payed in full by email and £50 compensation over a week no email no compensation.Please avoid this company disgusting customer services.

Attempted to pay off the balance of car finance online, but it was "referred" to customer service. Rang and waited 37 minutes before giving up in frustration....

I had to wait an hour to get in touch with them. I do not recommend this finance company to anyone

Just wondered if anyone works here? I want to change my direct debit information but the only way to do this is the print out a form and send it to an address. Firstly not very eco friendly and secondly it’s extremely inconvenient, I don’t have a printer! Every time I have ever called I haven’t ever spoken to anyone because by the time someone answers after hours of calling I get messages like the lines are now closed please call back again tomorrow or the most infuriating one was that I called waited hours for them to pick up and hang up!!

Horrific. Avoid at all costs.
I had car finance with them which ended in June. They continued to take DD payments for July and August. I hadn’t cancelled the DD with my bank, as I didn’t want any mistakes to adversely affect my credit rating.
I’m still waiting for my refund, having complained a month ago, with no sign of any progress and no one willing to discuss it with me.
Honestly I don’t know how they are allowed to trade like this. If anyone else took large sums of money out of my account, it would be theft and I’d be going to the police.
So angry and also stressed about the financial impact this is having on me and my family.

An absolutely terrible unprofessional company that will cause you nothing but stress. Take an hour to get through to speak to someone who is absolutely no help whatsoever. I honestly do not know how they get away with being so unprofessional this day and age.

Very poor customer service including waiting on the phone for an hour and having to give up as still not snswered

Appalling customer service, impossible to deal with, avoid at all costs. I contacted them at 8 am on Monday morning but have not had any response to my frequent calls and emails. Their telephone line is impossible to get through to anyone other than at 8 am each day, their call centre staff are ill informed on the legal agreement wording and the promised manager call within 72 hours never materialised.