How Tide ranks against Great Britain’s biggest business current account providers

It’s best practice to compare business bank account providers when searching for an ideal one to join. But once you’ve opened an account, how often do you get the time to compare it against the competition to make sure you’re getting the best deal?

With the cost of living rising, it’s more important than ever to check the value that business bank account providers offer – whether you want to open an account for the first time or already have one.

Here’s a breakdown of the results of a recent independent survey which ranks the quality provided by Great Britain’s largest business current account providers, including Tide.

Table of contents

• How and why the survey took place
• Why we’re sharing these results with you
• The results of the survey
• Wrapping up

How and why the survey took place

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) works to promote competition amongst businesses. This competition encourages businesses to prioritise innovation and value for money, which helps customers like you get better services for a fair price.

The CMA investigated the retail banking sector in 2016 over concerns that the sector wasn’t working well enough in certain areas for its customers. Following this, they set up a survey to get an independent view of the quality of service given to business and personal account holders. The survey is updated and published twice a year, in February and August.

As part of a regulatory requirement, relevant business account providers must participate in each survey and share their ranking on their website, apps and in branches, if they have them.

Between July 2021 and June 2022, research specialist BVA BDRC asked around 1,200 customers of each of the 15 largest business current account providers if they’d recommend their provider to other small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). These results were published in August 2022.

Why we’re sharing these results with you

The August 2022 edition of the survey is the first that we’ve participated in. We’re very proud to have placed in the top five in three categories, and would like to thank all our members that took part! 🎉

Alongside sharing the results in this blog post, we’ve also published them at the request of the CMA on a dedicated independent service quality results page. By sharing these results, we’re not giving you any advice or making any recommendations. We can only provide you with information about our products and services.

The results of the survey

This year, we were assessed alongside 14 other business current account providers. That includes the four largest banking groups, collectively called the Big Four (HSBC UK, Lloyds Bank, Natwest and Barclays) and digital banks like Monzo and Starling.

The survey results show the proportion of customers of each provider, among those who took part in the survey, who said they were ‘extremely likely’ or ‘very likely’ to recommend each service to other SMEs.

• 75% of our members would recommend our online and mobile banking services

• 68% of Tide participants in the survey would recommend our service

• 66% of our members would recommend our relationship and account management

Some results couldn’t be provided

• SME overdraft and loan services: We provide credit (overdraft and loan) services; however, fewer than 100 Tide members provided an eligible score for this part of the survey, which means the results weren’t provided

• Service in branches and business centres: This part of the survey didn’t apply to us because we don’t operate a branch network

Wrapping up

Amongst the 15 largest business current account providers included in this survey, we’re so pleased to be ranked:

• 3rd highest for online and mobile banking services (75% of our members would recommend ours)
• 4th highest for overall service quality (68% of our members would recommend us)
• 4th highest for relationship and account management (66% of our members would recommend us)

These achievements build upon our bumper year in 2021 and come as we launch new features and welcome more members. We’re excited to keep supporting you and your business as we continue to grow! 🚀

Image by Brooke Cagle, published on Unsplash

Disclaimer: This survey was independently carried out. Neither Tide nor any other body affiliated with the survey is endorsed by the CMA. The information provided here is correct as of 1 September 2022.