Santander 1|2|3 current account: what happened to it

The Santander 1|2|3 current account is closed to new customers. Santander no longer lists it among the accounts it offers, and the pages that once described it now carry the Everyday Current Account instead. If you already hold a 1|2|3 account you keep it on its existing terms, but there is no way for a new customer to open one.

What Santander offers now is a range of accounts rather than a single flagship one: the Everyday Current Account, the Edge, Edge Up and Edge Explorer accounts, the Select and Choice accounts, and the Basic Current Account. The one with a deadline attached is the Everyday Current Account, which carries a £240 Switch & Save offer that ends on 7 October 2026¹.

That offer is not simply a switching payment. To qualify you have to switch using the Current Account Switch Service, hold both the Everyday Current Account and a Santander Regular Saver, and fund the Regular Saver with at least £200 within 60 days of your switch request². The £240 arrives 90 days after you request the switch, not on the day you move².

The £240 Switch & Save offer on the Everyday Current Account ends 7 October

The offer runs from 1 September until 7 October 2026, and it is the switch request that has to fall inside that window, not the completion of the switch¹. Santander states plainly that if it stops the offer before your switch is complete, you will still get the £240 as long as you are eligible². That matters if you are partway through a switch as the deadline passes.

The conditions are cumulative rather than alternative. You must continue to hold both the Santander Regular Saver and the Santander Everyday Current Account, including two active household Direct Debits, on the date Santander makes the payment¹. The Regular Saver itself requires you to hold a Santander current account, though not a 1|2|3 Mini account held in trust⁷. The £200 funding requirement has to be met within 60 days of the switch request³.

There is a second set of conditions, and the two versions of the terms are not identical in effect. One version says the offer is not available if you held a current account with Santander on 1 January 2026, or if you have previously received a Santander switcher incentive; another version states the same restriction in different words¹. If you are unsure whether you qualify, the account terms you are given at the point of switching are the ones that govern your application.

For context on how these offers compare, Which? records the Santander Everyday offer period as 1 September to 7 October 2026 with a £240 switching bonus, and notes a Starling personal current account offer running from 10 August to 11 October 2026 that gives a free electric toothbrush rather than cash³. The general mechanics of these payments are set out in how bank switching offers work, and if a payment does not arrive there is a route through Switch Bonus Not Paid: What to Do.

Other Santander current accounts: basic, student and support options

Beyond the Everyday account, Santander's range covers a basic account, student accounts and accounts aimed at people who want cashback on bills.

The Basic Current Account is the one to know about if you have been refused a standard account elsewhere or have a poor credit history. It lets you receive payments, pay bills and set up regular payments such as standing orders and direct debits, and it is managed online or through mobile banking, but mobile payment services are not supported⁸. You can apply online or by phone, and Santander has a dedicated team to help people who cannot access digital banking⁸. Santander is designated under the Payment Accounts Regulations to offer basic bank accounts, and had a nominal volume of upgrades and no migrations in the year to June 2024⁹. The wider rules on who qualifies are in Basic bank accounts explained and Who can get a basic bank account.

For students, the Santander Edge Student current account is the current offering, and the window to open or transfer into it to enter a prize draw closes on 16 October 2026¹⁰. A separate prize draw offering £500 in food and supermarket vouchers closes on 12 November 2026 and is open to UK students over 18 whether or not they are Santander customers¹⁰. Student accounts generally work differently from standard ones, which is covered in Student bank accounts.

Santander also runs the Edge, Edge Up and Edge Explorer accounts, and the Select and Choice accounts¹¹. A £150 hotel voucher offer for customers who opened or transferred to an Edge Explorer account ran from 30 June 2026 to 16 September 2026 and has now ended¹¹. Accounts that pay cashback on bills are a distinct category, explained in Reward and cashback current accounts.

Banking with Santander: branches and the app

Santander can be used online, through its mobile app, by phone and in branch. You can open a current account online, with the mobile app or by visiting a branch¹². Account and card details are held in the app behind log-in and extra checks, which Santander describes as keeping them safer than carrying them¹³.

The branch network is shrinking. Santander has 40 branches scheduled to close in 2026 and four more in 2027, part of 314 branch closures scheduled across UK banks for 2026, of which 116 are Lloyds, 88 Halifax and 40 Santander⁵. It closed 95 branches in 2025⁵. In Northern Ireland, seven Santander branches closed in 2025 with four more due to close in 2026¹⁴. Against that, Santander has said it will not close further branches before 2028, and in September 2026 it announced 31 branches for refurbishment under a £17 million programme alongside new Work Café openings⁵.

If your branch goes, the alternatives are the Post Office, banking hubs and cash machines. The FCA's rules on access to cash, and Santander's status as a firm covered UK wide, are set out in Access to cash: cash machines, banking hubs and deposit services and Bank branch closures and what replaces them. How much notice a bank must give before closing a branch is covered in How much notice must a bank give before closing a branch?.

On 25 September 2026 thousands of Santander customers could not access online banking through their phones around midday, with reports of problems falling from 3,620 to 700¹³. If an outage leaves you out of pocket, the route is a complaint to Santander and then the Financial Ombudsman Service. Compensation for system failures is covered in Compensation when your bank's systems go down, and what to do when you cannot get in is in What to do if you can't access online banking.

Sending money abroad and the BIC code

For international payments, Santander's BIC, also known as a SWIFT code, is ABBYGB2LXXX⁴. Anyone sending you money from an overseas account will need that, along with an IBAN or a bank code and account number, which is the standard set of details for overseas accounts¹⁵.

If money goes astray, Santander's number for calling from outside the UK is +44 1908 216674, and from inside the UK it is 0333 207 2229¹⁶. For personal banking enquiries generally, Santander lists 0330 9 123 123¹⁷. The documents give more than one contact number for Santander and they are not reconciled, so check the number on your statement or in the app before calling.

Sending money to the wrong account is a common problem with its own recovery process, covered in Paid Money to the Wrong Person by Mistake. The general rules on transfers are in Bank transfers: Faster Payments, Bacs and CHAPS, and the name-checking system that catches many mistakes before they happen is in Confirmation of Payee explained.

Complaints record and extra help with money

The Financial Ombudsman Service publishes how many complaints it receives about each business. In the first quarter of 2026/27 it opened 8,945 complaints about current accounts, 2,103 about personal loans, 993 about business current accounts, 228 about credit records, 129 about store card accounts, 124 about second charge mortgages, 122 about packaged bank accounts, 77 about money remittance, 58 about savings certificates or bonds, 50 about payment instruments and 33 about credit broking⁶. These are totals across the businesses the ombudsman covers, not figures for Santander alone.

If you need extra help managing your money, Santander said in September 2026 that it will refer customers and their families who may need extra support directly to Sibstar, whose card and app carry a monthly fee and a one-off set up fee¹³. Santander also has a dedicated team for people who cannot access digital banking⁸. The wider picture of what banks must offer is in Accessible banking and extra support from banks and building societies.

Santander's Basic Current Account is part of a scheme to help homeless people open bank accounts, alongside other banks⁸. If you are struggling with borrowing rather than day-to-day banking, Struggling to repay an overdraft: help and options and Debt: a complete guide to help, solutions and your rights set out the free and impartial routes, including MoneyHelper and debt advice charities.