Santander, the Spain-based banking group that owns Abbey, Bradford & Bingley and Alliance & Leciester, will launch a free current account, with no charges for overdraft use or access to foreign ATMs, reported The Times Online. Santander said that the interest rate on any overdraft usage will be 12.9% and a fixed rate of 6% will be applied to credit for one year.
However, the account, named as Santander Zero Current Account, will only be available to customers who take out a mortgage with it. The customers of Alliance & Leicester will have to wait until the bank rebrands later in the year. For the customers of Abbey and Bradford & Bingley, the account is available when the two banks rebrand as Santander in January 2010.
Reportedly, the announcement comes ahead of the Supreme Court’s final ruling on whether the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has the power to decide if overdraft charges are fair or not.
Antonio Horta-Osorio, chief executive of Santander UK, said: “Santander is uniquely placed amongst UK banks to change the way it does business, and our new approach is one based on simplicity, the more business you do with us, the more we will offer you in return,” reported the web site.
