In the news

I was on bbc news just now and went to school with the lass in the story that has had 9 grand nicked out her and her partner's joint account! Literally nuts how easy the fraudsters got it as well. Also really bad that they may not get it back either.

I don't really understand what's happening.

TSBs computers went to shit > Taking advantage of this fact, fraudsters are somehow withdrawing money at a rate of knots from customers great and small > TSB are saying "not our fault, no refunds for you"?

Is there more to it?

There were lots of people reporting access to other people's accounts while the upgrade was happening - they'd log on, sometimes see their details and also the details/accounts of random strangers with full access to everything. A guy on the radio reported all of his security details being changed!

Is this going on at the moment?

Why are larger companies a problem? They tend to be more productive, pay higher wages, are more innovative and offer more stable employment. Easier to regulate too.

I believe they were bought by a European bank following their spinoff from Lloyds. This bank itself specialised in buying small banks, which it could consolidate onto its existing IT systems, saving tonnes of money along the way. TSBs accounts were significantly larger and more complex than what they migrated onto was able to handle, and there's evidently plenty of stuff they were unable to test sufficiently before it hit Prod:

Insider story here:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/apr/28/warning-signs-for-tsbs-it-meltdown-were-clear-a-year-ago-insider

Ta for the link. Utterly crazy. Surely at some stage the FCA/other has to step in? I know two customers who have lost in the tens of thousands and another who's mortgage payments haven't been going through.

Brexit will fix this if you believe strongly enough.

know two customers who have lost in the tens of thousands

I've thought about this is the past. There's nothing other than my banking app and online banking linking me with my accounts - how would I prove my balance were something like this to happen to me; individually you'd have no chance of persuading your bank to revert to their tape backups or whatever they needed to proof a loss.

Brexit will fix this if you believe strongly enough.

Spanish banks, coming over here, messing up our historic companies. grumbles

Do you mean how you'd find out your balance on XX day?
If you lost control of your apps and online banking you could always go into a branch and ask.

Yes, I guess I was just being nostalgic. I meant if TSB happened to me. I've not had a paper statement in years - I don't know how I could prove my balance if their IT went down.

Banking software is generally awful. It really isn't that many years ago that I was looking at Deutsche Bank's code and estimating how much time and effort it would be to remove the thousands of 'if Netscape then do X, if IE6 then do Y' type branching code and make it run on something that hadn't been obsolete for years, so they could upgrade their IT equipment.

According to Twitter Tommy Robinson has been arrested for live-streaming outside a court, charged with breach of the peace and sentenced to 13 months - he was already serving a suspended sentence.

Free movement of people

You mean free movement of labour.

xenophobic unions

That one might need some unpacking.

If you really want to take a stand against institutional racism then perhaps you could start by protesting the inherently racist nature of the EU single market. Challenging though given that it barely functions as a democracy.

Free movement of labour yes, you need a job within 3 months and there a restrictions on benefits.

But after 5 years you get permanent residence and there is right to family reunification. It's a lot more liberal immigration system than what most of the world has.

If unions back "British jobs for British workers" by supporting more restrictions on immigrant labourers like me then xenophobia is perhaps not the right term, but it's hardly solidarity with immigrant workers either. Especially not as controls already exist, see above.

Inherently racist? Em, how so?

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/irish-times-exit-poll-projects-ireland-has-voted-by-landslide-to-repeal-eighth-amendment-1.3508861

Ace. 💪

If unions back "British jobs for British workers"

That’s what they are paid to do, in the sense that they will always support people here - their members - above people who aren’t here.

Disgusting.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/25/woman-shot-dead-border-patrol-rio-bravo-texas-identified

Keep good people around you. This is some fucking gang of accomplices.

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But immigrants workers are also here, a little bit of support would be nice, rather than this two tier worker system.

Though most unions do support staying in the single market. Unison is very active on immigrants rights. Unite is very lukewarm.

I guess he means supporting the ones who are here already working and in said union comes above supporting those who may want to come here.

Ace indeed.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/25/ireland-votes-to-relax-abortion-laws

Looks like a proper referendum result.

The will of the people.

Once the result is declared the No lot should be made to keep campaigning for another 40 weeks.

Yep.

Would be interesting to see the stats on residence status and union membership.