Face-to-face Banking Services

Lord Bellingham Excerpts

Thursday 18th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

The noble Baroness raises a valid point. We must wait for the results of this review to see what it says. It is important that we have an enabling clause in the Financial Services and Markets Bill, and that we are able to implement the recommendations of that report as soon as possible.

[Lord Bellingham (Con)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as someone who has had two bad experiences with banks recently. The first was in a personal capacity when ringing the Barclays call centre. No one would give their name or number, and so they lost the business: it was frustrating. The other experience was as chairman of an SME, which was going through its KYC for the directors. We had to go through Revolut’s automated bots and software, and it cost the company a vast amount of money. No real person would talk to us; five or six emails were never replied to. That too was a bad experience. What more can the Minister do to persuade these banks to take small businesses more seriously?

[Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)]

I refer back to the review that has taken place into access to banking services. We are encouraging small businesses, and the business sector that will use the review, to get involved with that consultation and raise the issues the noble Lord has mentioned.