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Our H2 2020 results continue to show significant reductions in complaints volumes across Barclays UK year-on-year, largely due to coronavirus causing decreased customer activity.

  • Excluding Payment Protection Insurance, we have seen an overall reduction in BUK complaints year-on-year (36%) but a slight increase half-on-half (2%).
  • We have seen the drop in BUK banking complaints versus 2019 continue (down 2% on H1-20 and 43% on H2-19). This is largely due to decreased customer spending and transactions.
  • We have seen a 32% decline in complaints for investments versus the second half of 2019.

Samantha White, Barclays UK Head of Virtual Channels, said: During this difficult time, we understand that our customers expect their bank to provide a flawless service, which is why we strive to provide a great experience no matter the channel they choose to interact with us through, be it branch, by phone or via our mobile app or online banking.

“It’s encouraging to see complaints reduce again year-on-year, however we will continue to work tirelessly to meet and exceed the expectations of our customers

We are one of the largest financial service providers in the UK, so it also makes sense to look at the numbers in the context of our size. For example, in the banking category, we received 43% fewer complaints per 1,000 accounts than in H2 2019.

We remain absolutely committed to delivering excellent customer experiences, and exceeding what our customers expect from their bank. In recent months, we have taken steps to:

Continue to support our customers and clients through coronavirus

Our number one priority is our customers and continuing to support them throughout this period. We have provided over 680,000 payment holidays to our customers, waived over £100m of fees and interest charges and granted hundreds of thousands of payment holidays, to help them through this difficult time.

We continue to support an estimated one million SME customers across the UK through the ongoing challenges of the coronavirus pandemic, helping UK businesses with the Bounce Back Loan (BBL) and Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan (CBIL) schemes, facilitating over £11 billion worth of funding. Our wider financial support measures, such as free everyday banking and overdrafts, also provided a critical supporting hand to SMEs with a turnover of under £250k throughout 2020.

In addition to lending, to make things easier for our customers, our other partnerships such as Propel, MarketFinance, Nimbla and Smart Pension provide businesses with even more flexibility and choice to best suit their financial needs through innovative asset finance, invoice finance, invoice insurance and employee pension solutions respectively.

Protect our customers against fraud and scams

We’re committed to protecting our customers and colleagues and ensuring that we provide as much education and awareness as we can, across social media, email and app notifications, to help safeguard them against fraud and scams. We have also increased our colleague awareness and training to help our colleagues better protect customers. The training is intended to upskill and help colleagues spot scams, as well as have the right conversations with customers and is delivered across multiple platforms including face-to-face, video and over the phone.

In September 2020, we introduced Payment Purpose into our branch and telephony channels. Payment Purpose asks customers to select from one of nine ‘payment purpose’ options for the reason they’re making the payment. We then present them with a tailored scams warning message suitable for that type of scam including actions we would like the customer to carry out.

Additionally, we are part of the ‘Do not originate’ scheme, created in partnership with the telecommunications industry, UK Finance and Ofcom, to prevent our most common inbound helpline phone numbers from being used in a scam. Participating telephone companies are provided with phone numbers that we use only for inbound customer calls and never for outbound. These numbers are then blocked should the telephone companies see them being spoofed by fraudsters. We are passionate about protecting our customers from fraudsters, so when the opportunity to contribute to this scheme came up we were keen to take part.

Help customers stay in control of their finances

We’re always working to build better ways to help our customers manage their money. In September we launched Barclays Savings Goals in the Barclays app, which helps work out how much is needed to save each day, week or month, in order to hit a target, and offers a personalised tracker to help people monitor their progress and keep on top of their goal.

We also launched Money Workouts, a free pilot allowing people to try out six different savings challenges to help shape up their finances.

For those looking to invest their savings, we launched Plan & Invest, a new digital advice service to tackle the UK’s advice gap and give more people the confidence and support to invest their savings. The service creates a personalised investment plan that is tailored to a customer’s goals, with Barclays then managing the investments on their behalf – traditionally known as discretionary portfolio management.

Barclays Bank UK PLC

Firm name: Barclays Bank UK PLC (BBUKPLC)
Other firms included in this report (if any): 
Barclays Insurance Services Company Ltd, Barclays Investment Solutions Ltd, Clydesdale Financial Services Ltd and Barclays Asset Management Ltd.
Brands/trading names covered: 
Barclays Bank UK Plc., Barclaycard, Barclays Wealth, Smart Investor, Barclays Business Bank, Barclays Partner Finance and Wealth Management

  Provision (at end of reporting end date) Intermediation (within the reporting period) Number of complaints opened Number of complaints closed
Closed within 3 days (%) Closed After 3 Days but within 8 weeks (%) Upheld (%) Main Cause of Complaints opened
Banking and credit cards 3.33 N/A 122,642 124,766 52% 39% 59% General admin / customer service
Home finance 15.36 N/A
13,566 12,959 37% 47% 67% General admin / customer service
Insurance and pure protection 12.51 N/A 12,465 121,943 1% 3% 71% Advising, selling and arranging
Decumulation and pensions N/A
5.97 137 138 30% 49% 44% General admin / customer service
Investments 8.11 N/A 3,838 3,786 26% 39% 54% General admin / customer service
Credit Related
3.44 N/A
10,326 10,732 54% 37% 55% N/A
Total
N/A
N/A
162,974 274,324 28% 23% 65% N/A

Barclays Bank PLC

Firm name: Barclays Bank PLC (BBPLC)
Other firms included in this report (if any): N/A
Brands/trading names covered:
 Barclays Bank PLC, Barclays Corporate Bank, Barclays Private Bank.

  Provision (at end of reporting end date) Intermediation (within the reporting period) Number of complaints opened Number of complaints closed
Closed within 3 days (%) Closed After 3 Days but within 8 weeks (%) Upheld (%) Main Cause of Complaints opened
Banking and credit cards 7.66 N/A 9,361 10,398 70% 18% 65% General admin / customer service
Home finance 7.06 N/A
5 6 17% 83% 67% General admin / customer service
Insurance and pure protection N/A
N/A 0 1 0% 100% 0% General admin / customer service
Decumulation and pensions N/A
N/A
N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A General admin / customer service
Investments 1.44 N/A 32 43 33% 35% 51% General admin / customer service
Credit Related
66.80 N/A
31 29 34% 48% 83% N/A
Total
N/A
N/A
9,429 10,477 70% 18% 65% N/A

Glossary

The following definitions have been used in assembling this data.

Definitions

Provision
The number of complaints per 1,000 accounts or insurance policies a firm maintains for customers at reporting period end date (1st July 2020 to 31st December 2020)

Intermediation
The number of complaints per 1,000 sales, or transactions for customers within reporting period (1st July 2020 to 31st December 2020)

Number of Complaints Opened
This includes all complaints received during the reporting period of 1st July 2020 to 31st December 2020

Number of Complaints Closed
A complaint is deemed closed once Barclays has sent a final decision letter or the customer has indicated that they accept our response.

Complaints closed within 3 days (%)
A complaint is deemed closed within 3 days once Barclays has sent a summary resolution communication letter or the customer has indicated that they accept our response within 3 days of receiving the complaint.

Complaints closed after 3 days but within 8 weeks (%)
A complaint is deemed closed after 3 days but within 8 weeks where Barclays has sent a final decision letter or the customer has indicated that they accept our response within this specific period of receiving the complaint.

Complaints Upheld by Firm
A complaint is deemed ‘upheld’ where Barclays agreed with the customer that their complaint was justified, either in whole or in part. We may have offered redress, where appropriate.

Categories of Banking Services and Products

The FCA has six Categories of Banking Services and Products which firms are required to report against. Some examples of what is included within each of these categories can be found below:

  • Banking and Credit Cards: Current accounts, savings accounts, cash and debit cards, credit cards;
  • Home Finance: House mortgages, home income plans, home purchase plans;
  • Insurance and Pure Protection: Property insurance, travel insurance, medical insurance, payment protection insurance (PPI);
  • Decumulation and Pensions: Annuities, pension plans. Decumulation describes a process to realise assets (such as shares) into an income stream, often during retirement;
  • Investments: Share dealings, unit trusts, ISAs, derivatives.
  • Credit related: Hire purchase, Debt purchasing, Home credit.

Notes

Data included in the above tables refers to complaints both received and closed between 1 July 2020 to 31 December 2020 inclusive.

Next Publication Date:

H1 2021: 31 August 2021 for complaints data from 1 January 2021 to 30 June 2021