Current account winners and losers
Issue 517 | 8 August 2023
1.2 million switches in past 12 months
In the latest Current Account Switch Service (CASS) dashboard, published by Pay.UK, we find out how many of us transferred our bank account in Q2 2023 and who the switching winners and losers were in Q4 2022.
Spoiler alert: The latest Current Account Switch Service data reveals a 50% increase in switches on the previous year, with 1,277,484 switches having taken place over the twelve months covering 1 July 2022 to 30 June 2023.
2023 current account switching numbers
The historic performance of the switching service was severely disrupted by the COVID pandemic, however a clear recovery has taken place. As CASS approaches its tenth anniversary in September, the last five months has seen monthly switch volumes in six figures - a feat only achieved three times in the period January 2020 to December 2022.
The Service continues to play a vital role in allowing people and businesses the flexibility to change accounts and find a banking partner that better suits their needs. This quarter’s switching figures demonstrate a healthy and competitive switching environment for consumers and businesses during a time of economic uncertainty with high inflationary pressures. People can rest assured that if they decide to move to a new banking provider through the Current Account Switch Service, the process will be quick, free and easy.
John Dentry, Product Owner at Pay.UK.
Since launch in September 2013 CASS has facilitated 9.5 million switches and successfully redirected 137.8 million payments.
Q2 2023: CASS performance
The CASS insights published by Pay.UK (the operator of the switching service) show us the following monthly switching volumes for the first half of 2023:
Between April and June 2023, the Current Account Switch Service saw a 76% increase in the number of switches on the same period last year, with a total of 338,194 switches across 48 participating banks and building societies taking place (compared to 191,777 in Q2 2022).
Pay.UK have also published the following service performance insights….
Satisfaction, awareness and confidence
In Q2 2023 the Current Account Switch Service:
surpassed its 90% satisfaction target, hitting 91%.
met its awareness target of 75%.
was well regarded with 86% of Current Account Switch Service end users stating that they would recommend the switching sevrice.
Reasons for switching
7 in 10 (71%) switchers preferred their new current account to their previous one:
service-related, non-financial benefits continued to be the main reasons end users preferred their new account.
but 2% said that in some the new account was worse.
Those who switched current account through the Service over Q2 2023 cited better online or mobile app banking (41%) and customer service (29%) as the top two reasons for preferring their new account.
Financial factors also ranked highly, with interest earned (29%) and account fees or charges (25%) coming in as the third and fourth most important factors.
99.5% of switches were completed within the SLA of seven working days.
Just 5,814 small business and charity accounts switches took place during Q2 2023:
Q1 2023: Participant performance
Pay.UK publish participant CASS data a quarter in arrears so the latest data provides an insight into switches completed in Q1 2023.
Here’s the winners and losers broken down by participant:
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Payments:Unpacked to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.