FNB Staggering Incompetence

Simply staggering incompetence from FNB, of the kind that eventually destroys large institutions. While travelling, I paid a R1000 deposit to a hotel using my debit card. The hotel later realised they had mistakenly treated the payment as if it were made by credit card. Because a third-party payment processor was used, they can only refund the deposit to a credit card — not a debit card. The hotel is fully willing to refund me and even provided a letter confirming this. Despite explaining this situation repeatedly to FNB over months, I eventually received a response — four months later — stating: “The transaction is valid and you will be debited for this amount.” This completely misses the point. The merchant does not want the money. They are actively trying to return it. So who keeps it? Not the hotel — the money now sits in limbo with a third-party processor, while FNB simply washes its hands of the problem. This is not a minor issue. It reveals a serious lack of understanding and accountability. The indifference shown by FNB is staggering, and the four-month delay only compounds the problem. This is unlikely to be an isolated case. Multiply this by thousands of similar situations, and you have a bank slowly eroding trust through sheer incompetence. After 30 years in advertising, I have seen how major brands collapse — not from one big mistake, but from repeated small failures and a culture that stops caring. FNB appears to be heading down that same path. The next generation of customers will not remain loyal to a brand that cannot solve basic problems — and may not even know or care who FNB is. Sadly, judging by this experience, neither does FNB itself.