Guarantee provides peace of mind for anyone switching current account
September 11, 2013: The Payments Council reached a major milestone by making public the Current Account Switch Guarantee and Trustmark that will be used by all participating financial institutions, from the launch of the new service in September. The new Guarantee and Trustmark are designed to give consumers trust and confidence when switching current accounts.
The new service aims to increase competition in banking by making it simpler and hassle-free for customers to switch their current account. The switching process will be completed within seven working days – a substantial improvement on the current process that can take between 18 and 30 days. The full Guarantee and Trustmark are reproduced at the bottom of this release. The Guarantee details the key benefits of the new service, which include:
- The service is free to use
- The customer can choose and agree the switch date with their new current account provider
- The new current account provider will take care of moving all payments going out (e.g Direct Debits) and those coming in (e.g. salary)
- For 13 months the new current account provider will arrange for payments accidentally made to the old account to be automatically redirected to the new account
- If anything goes wrong with the switch, as soon as it is told the new current account provider will refund any interest and charges made on either a customer’s old or new current account as a result of the failure.
Adrian Kamellard, Chief Executive of the Payments Council, comments:
“Giving customers the confidence to switch current accounts is one of our main goals and the new Guarantee and Trustmark launched today should really help achieve this regardless of whom you switch to or from. It sets out in simple terms what you should expect and how long it will take, with the added peace of mind that should anything go wrong your new current account provider is responsible to you for putting things right.
“Although the service will make life simple for customers, delivering it has involved massive systems changes both centrally and within individual financial institutions. This project, along with the national advertising campaign to raise awareness of the new service, represents an investment of more than £750 million.”
From September, banks and building societies offering the new service will be displaying this Trustmark and delivering the benefits that make up the Current Account Switch Guarantee. This Trustmark will also appear in all advertising from launch onwards and will act as an easily-identifiable logo that consumers will associate with the new service – much in the way that the Direct Debit logo is now a regularly accepted and known symbol representing the Direct Debit Guarantee.
Source : Payment Council