Banks & building societies
If your bank or building society fails and can’t pay back your money, FSCS can automatically pay you compensation. Your bank or building society must be authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority - check this on the Financial Services Register.
Banks and building societies
If the firm failed after 1 Jan 2017
If you hold money with a UK-authorised bank, building society or credit union that fails, we’ll automatically compensate you.
- up to £85,000 per eligible person, per bank, building society or credit union.
- up to £170,000 for joint accounts.
We protect certain qualifying temporary high balances up to £1 million for six months from when the amount was first deposited.
You don’t need to do anything – FSCS will compensate you automatically.
You can easily see how much of your money is protected by using our bank & savings protection checker.
Limitations
Where you hold your money could affect how much compensation you’re entitled to. If you have money in multiple accounts with banks that are part of the same banking group (and share a banking licence) we have to treat them as one bank. This means that our compensation limit applies to the total amount you hold across all these accounts, not to each separate account.
For our compensation limit to apply to each individual account, you’d need to hold money with different banks that don’t share a licence. You can search the financial services register on the Financial Conduct Authority’s website to see which banks share a licence or check the lists of banking and building society brands on the Bank of England's website.
You can easily see how much of your money is protected by using our bank & savings protection checker. Click the button to get started.