Black Beauty: A thoroughbred quadruped?

May I add my little bit of faint knowledge to this discussion re dividends:

My understanding is that you must deal , i.e. contract to buy on the day before they go ex-dividend to have entitlement for the dividend . This agrees with the comment made above by Roger . On the day that they do go ex-dividend, the buyer usually buys at a lower price to account for the drop in value .
The deal , if made on the day before its goes ex-div , is not settled on that day but on the day specified by the contract (May be T+3 or other) . On the day of settlement the money goes to the seller 's (of the shares) broker or nominee broker (not to the company) via intermediaries , i.e. broker and /or market maker and the shares go to the buyers nominee broker . On the day of settlement a clearing process takes place to settle delivery of shares against money , the transaction is recorded then by the company's registrar who adds the name of the new shareholder (nominee broker)to the company share register and removes the entry of holding of the seller . If for any reason (failure to deliver shares or money) the transaction can not be settled as per contract then settlement is delayed or abandoned . The company has a record date deadline and issues the dividend to the registered shareholder but through a process of internal administration at the brokers the dividend is channelled to the party who is entitled to it under the contract (i.e. depends on deal date vis-a-vis ex-div date).
I have also contacted the LLOY registrars re the likely ex-div date . The date has not yet been announced but judging by precedence in previous years it is likely to come after February 20th (February options expiry date) and some time after that in late February (see ADVFN fundamentals on LLOY).

P.S. If anybody on here has detailed knowledge of the share dealing and settlement process and any of the points above are incorrect then please let me know since I am always seeking to improve my market knowledge .