Adrian Johnson
TLDR:
- SMEs are losing out on over £7.5bn in interest due to big banks offering lower rates.
- The Great British Savings Squeeze campaign aims to highlight banking inequalities faced by small businesses.
SMEs across the country are losing out on more than £7.5bn of interest each year due to big banks ‘short changing’ them on their savings. The Great British Savings Squeeze campaign, launched by Allica Bank, aims to highlight banking inequalities faced by small businesses, and is backed by the Institute of Directors, Federation of Small Businesses, British Independent Retailers Association and British Independent Retailers Association.
The campaign said that ‘because there’s no transparency in the savings market, small firms are getting ripped off and not getting the interest they deserve on their hard-earned savings’. It calls for the end of the SME savings penalty, where banks offer lower savings rates to small businesses, on average 2% below that on offer to larger companies.
Allica Bank, which offers full service banking for SMEs with between five and 250 employees, has long been calling on the wider banking industry to give small businesses a better deal on their savings, allowing this money to be pumped back into local economies.
Richard Davies, CEO of Allica Bank, said: ‘It is a scandal that SMEs are missing out on more than £7.5bn of interest on their hard-earned cash every year, leaving small firms short changed and holding back vital funding from local economies.’
The Great British Savings Squeeze campaign is aiming to raise awareness of this hidden savings penalty, and to gather high profile support and drive real industry wide change in the sector.
