The Board of Banking Competition Remedies (BCR) has announced the 11 organisations which meet the eligibility criteria for the Incentivised Switching Scheme.

BCR is the independent body established to implement the £775 million Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) State Aid Alternative Remedies Package.

The purpose of the Incentivised Switching Scheme is to provide funding of up to a maximum total of £275 million to SME customers of RBS’ Williams & Glyn business, to switch their business current accounts and loans to ‘challenger’ institutions. A further maximum sum of £75 million has been set aside within RBS to cover certain customers’ switching costs.

The shortlist is as follows:

1. Arbuthnot Latham & Co
2. Clydesdale Bank
3. Co-operative Bank
4. Hampden & Co.
5. Metro Bank
6. Monzo Bank
7. Nationwide Building Society
8. Santander UK
9. Starling Bank
10. Svenska Handelsbanken
11. TSB Bank

BCR noted that Nationwide and Monzo meet all the eligibility criteria, but are yet to launch a business current account offering.

Nine of these have offers which are, in principle, due for publication on 25 February 2019. A further two organisations also meet all eligibility criteria and it is anticipated that they will launch or provide definitive offers in 2019.

Four organisations were not, at the time of application, live members of the Current Account Switch Service (CASS), which was one of a number of pre-set entry conditions agreed between the government and the European Commission. However, these four are confident their membership of CASS will be fully operational early next year.

Godfrey Cromwell, BCR’s chairman, said “It’s very good news that a broad selection of organisations have stepped forward and made a diversity of offers right across the SME client-base – today’s announcement marks an important milestone for Incentivised Switching.”

BCR will now engage with the organisations with reviewed offers in order to progress contracting and verification of operational readiness. On completing these processes, a dedicated website will place the organisations’ offers in front of former Williams and Glyn’s SME customers at the end of February.

BCR is considering a second application window in late spring 2019, with more information to will be issued in the New Year.

Cromwell concluded: “We look forward to getting through the contracting stage and seeing these offers made public so that customers can react, we anticipate that a further application round in the second quarter of 2019 will widen the range of offers still further.”

Share Story: