Nationwide/Barclays – “Bank isn’t eligible for transfers”

[Whisper2]

I logged into my Amex app this morning to pay my balance from my Nationwide account, but when I got to the “Payment Source – Pay with Bank Transfer” screen, both Nationwide and Barclays are greyed out and say “Bank isn’t eligible for transfers”. I have previously used Nationwide many times to pay my Amex bill.
Is this an Amex wide change or is it just for some people? It seems a bit odd to exclude two of the biggest high street banks whilst including the likes of revolut or Monzo.

[Skywalker]

I don’t know about the error but you can use your debit card to pay Amex in the meantime.

[Rob]

Whilst HSBC is always OK, some days when I pay my bill I see certain banks greyed out, and then next time I go in they are not. It’s very odd.

[Fennec]

Nationwide isn’t a bank (yet) – what is stopping you sending a Faster Payment from Nationwide Building Society to Amex?

[Alex G]

Although Nationwide is a Building Society, it is unique in that it is the only BS that directly participates in BACS, Faster Payments, and Image Clearance. In that sense it operates more like a bank than a Building Society.

[AJA]

I always initiate payments from my bank account – have all my credit cards set up as payees and just do a faster payment from there. I’ve never tries to pull the money from my bank account using the Amex site. Never had a problem.

[gerjomarty]

Some of these in-app payments use the Open Banking system to facilitate payments. The system has a mechanism where banks can declare themselves offline for planned or unplanned downtime if things go wrong. It could be that the Amex app is trying to hide how the sausage is made a little bit, just coming up with a generic message to explain why a bank can’t currently be used. This is just supposition on my part though! I can see that Nationwide’s OB had some maintenance planned overnight this evening, but it wasn’t a “drop everything on the floor” kind of maintenance.