Treasury has published its annual data as received from the nine largest personal current account providers (PCAs) in the UK.
Under the Payment Account Regulations 2015, Treasury has designated the PCAs to offer basic bank accounts to customers who not have a bank account or are not eligible for one, and are legally resident in the United Kingdom. The PCAs are:
- Barclays UK;
- The Co-operative Bank;
- HSBC UK;
- Lloyds Banking Group (including Halifax and Bank of Scotland brands);
- Nationwide Building Society;
- NatWest Group (including RBS and Ulster Bank brands);
- Santander UK;
- TSB; and
- Virgin Money (formerly Clydesdale & Yorkshire Bank).
Key highlights from the data, covering the period from July 2022 to June 2023, include:
- as of 30 June 2023, there were 7,363,018 basic bank accounts open at the nine institutions;
- Lloyds Bank had the largest single number of basic bank accounts open, with more than 2 million accounts equating to around a 30% market share;
- over 50,000 basic bank accounts were updated or migrated during the period;
- around 40,000 accounts were opened and around 36,000 accounts were closed during the period;
- over 100,000 basic bank account applications were refused.