Overseas banks in the UK

It depends on how the bank is set up here. If the UK branch or subsidiary is authorised in the UK, deposits are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme up to £120,000 per eligible person, per bank or banking group. If you are dealing with a branch in another country, that country's scheme usually applies instead. Check the firm on the Financial Services Register before depositing.

No. The customer does not have to live in the UK for FSCS protection to apply, but the bank or building society must be UK authorised. That means a UK-authorised bank can protect a customer who lives abroad, while a UK customer banking with an overseas branch of a UK firm may fall under the overseas scheme instead.

The standard limit is £120,000 per eligible person, per bank, building society or credit union. Protection is across all accounts held within the bank or banking group, not per account, so balances in two brands sharing one licence count together. Certain qualifying temporary high balances are protected up to £1.4 million for six months from when the amount was first deposited.

Use the Financial Services Register, which shows whether a firm is authorised or registered by the Financial Conduct Authority. The register also tells you which brands sit under the same permission, which matters because the compensation limit applies per licence rather than per brand. If a firm is not on the register, it is not UK authorised.

The Financial Ombudsman Service handles complaints about UK financial services and products, and consumers living outside the UK do use it. In one year it received 6,416 complaints from consumers living overseas. Whether it can look at your complaint depends on the firm and the service, so it is worth asking before you assume either way.

Large UK banks have separated, or ring-fenced, some of their services from other parts of their business to help protect your access to the systems people depend on every day. For a customer it means the day-to-day banking you rely on sits apart from riskier activities. It does not change your compensation limit, which still applies per bank or banking group.

Overseas firms with permission to accept deposits are within the scope of UK depositor protection rules where the deposits are held by a UK branch or subsidiary of the firm. Banks based outside the EEA, such as the Indian bank ICICI, have to be authorised by the FCA to operate in the UK and are covered by the FSCS on that basis.