One High Street banking group has recently announced it will be limiting its basic current account customers by not allowing them to use cashpoints from rival banks.
Both RBS and NatWest will no longer be allowing nearly one million of its customers access to their money from cash machines other than their own. The majority of these free account customers are among the poorest the bank has, research has shown.
Basic current accounts are used quite often by those who have struggled with debt in the past. The accounts are already quite limited, as they neither come with a chequebook or an overdraft facility, instead relying on ATMs to retrieve their cash.
Customer advocacy group Consumer Focus financial inclusion expert, Marie Burton, commented on the new limitation, calling it a ‘kick in the teeth’ for a large number of the most vulnerable customers of RBS. Those who reside in rural areas left with no nearby RBS or NatWest branded ATMs are one class of customer that is utterly disregarded by the new decision, she added.
83 per cent taxpayer owned RBS operates approximately 8,000 free cashpoints throughout the UK. The banking giant’s basic current account holders could access these ATMs, plus the country’s network of 33,500 free ones and its 21,700 fee-charging machines operated by rival banking companies previous to the change.
41 per cent taxpayer owned Lloyds Banking Group also bans its basic account holders from taking cash from any machines not operated by Lloyds, which number 4,200. The restrictions on these machines are even more stringent, however, as they are disallowed from using machines operated by either Bank of Scotland or Halifax, even though the two banking providers are also owned by Lloyds.