Some information about basic bank accounts here, including a range of facts and figures and graphs about things like refusals, and numbers being opened and closed.
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I quote
2.7 A basic bank account opened under the PARs may only be closed without the consumerās consent in limited circumstances, for example, if a consumer has knowingly used, or attempted to use, the account for illegal purposes, or if there has been no transaction on the account for more than 24 months.
Payment Account Regulation protects the unbanked then right?
Further to that
Under the PARs, designated institutions must refuse to open a basic bank account for a consumer where it would be unlawful for it to do so. This includes, for example, where opening an account would be contrary to the Fraud Act 2006 or the Money Laundering Regulations.2
2.9 Chart 2.D shows the number of basic bank account applications refused at each institution.
2.10 The charts below include cases where an application could not be accepted due to the customer not meeting a participating institutionās identification requirements (where these took place after a full application has been made) or fraud checks.
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Itās been tried before, and was quite a success - Girobank, now absorbed into Santander, was originally part of the Post Office.
I suppose National Savings & Investments could be broadened out into a full bank, perhaps in partnership with the Post Office, if the government really wanted to.
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Okay. So I have had some time to think about my opinion & position on this topic since I started it and I think after discussing this with many people and the input from people on this thread there is a way that this problem can be solved by meeting in the middle.
The way to do this is only a judge can add a CIFA onto someoneās account. If banks are concerned about someoneās behaviour. Report it. Job done. Until itās a conviction they shouldnāt have a CIFA. Close the account all you want. Without a CIFA they can go somewhere else right?
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What is most striking is how the number of bank accounts refused differs so much at different banks.
HSBC UK seems to have no accounts refused, compared with around 7,000 for Barclays, despite them having similar number of basic bank accounts in total.
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Is that not all down to risk appetite?
I imagine any payout they may have to make to set things straight is a drop in the ocean for HSBC but less so for Barclays?
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That would make sense and was basically what I thought. Guessing Santander UK is a bit more cautious about things like this, being the only bank refusing over 20,000 accounts.
Surprised me how Santander UK still had the third highest number of basic bank accounts, with Nationwide second.
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And these are basic accounts, that should be a lot easier to get? As set out by the framework.
At least it helps when people post here with problems, we can tell them to go and try HSBC!
Makes you wonder if thereās someone directing people to Lloyds vs the others for whatever reason as thereās a huge disparity in open accounts.
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Donāt forget the figures for Lloyds are skewed as they actually include three brands (Lloyds Bank, Halifax and Bank of Scotland).
My guess is most people would start by trying to open a basic account at their most local branch, then look further afield if rejected.
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They still seems massively skewed towards Lloyds banking group. They have nearly 2.5 million whereas the next highest has just over a million. Even Natwest which has RBS as well is nowhere near it.
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I thought Barclays was the worst
At a guess, itās a sort of doubling-up caused by widespread duplication of branches of Halifax and Lloyds in England and Wales, with Bank of Scotland in Scotland.
NatWest is mostly only NatWest branches in England and Wales, with RBS mainly confined to Scotland and Ulster Bank only in Northern Ireland.
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How can one tell basic account and proper accounts?
You canāt have certain features like lending or overdrafts. Some donāt come with cheques and I think they are restricted in that you canāt go into a unwarranted overdraft too
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My Sister Bank with Barclays and Nationwide. Iām aware Nationwide basic account card is Red however hers is also a basic account and her card is written FlexAccount only that she does not have overdraft am sure there is possibilities for Cheque too.
Same with Barclays, It says The Barclays Bank account she can use cheque with the app however no overdraft, I called her attention to confirm this!
Flex account isnāt a basic account, theyāre two different products.
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The might have just not had the card issued after account upgrade