As many of our longstanding members and supporters will recall, when the FSU was de-banked by PayPal back in 2022, we kicked up an almighty fuss in the public square – after senior politicians started asking questions, PayPal restored our account.
But we weren’t going to let the matter rest there. We saw this for what it was – the emergence of a Chinese-style social credit system, whereby if your political beliefs don’t align with the progressive ‘values’ of banks or payment processors like PayPal you lose access to their services.
We started talking to the then City Minister, Andrew Griffith, to see what could be done about it. He invited us to submit evidence to the Treasury about how widespread the de-banking phenomenon is. We duly did that, citing numerous cases – many of them members of the FSU.
In July 2023, following its review of the Payment Services Regulations, the government committed to toughening them up and stop banks and payment processors closing people’s accounts just because they’ve exercised their right to lawful free speech. Now the government has published details of the statutory instrument that will enact these reforms.
That’s a terrific result. Up until now, UK legislation has failed to keep pace with rapid technological change, including the digitalisation of financial transactions, which left British citizens exposed to the risk of being deplatformed by California-based Big Tech corporations simply for expressing dissenting views.
When a delegation from the FSU met with Mr Griffith last year, one of the issues we raised was the notice period that banks are allowed to give when they close an account. Previously, the 2017 Regulations said that customers should be given two months’ notice of termination “if the contract so provides”. But this didn’t impose any clear obligation on banks to give notice of termination, because it left the banks free to decide for themselves what their terms of service said. Banks were free to have such a provision in their terms of service if they wished, or not if they wished otherwise.
As we pointed out to Mr Griffiths, this limited the time customers had to appeal the decision, potentially raise a complaint with the Financial Ombudsman Service, and/or seek an alternative service. Treasury officials were interested in this point and it’s good to see that, following our intervention, the regulations will now have teeth. As per the government’s proposed amendments to the Regulations, banks have to give 90 days’ notice of termination, whatever their terms and conditions say.
If you’ve been de-banked, the first thing you should do is submit a Subject Access Request, demanding to see whatever information that company is holding on you. If it shows you’ve been discriminated against, you can then complain to the financial ombudsman and, if necessary, take the bank or payment processor to court. (See the FAQs we published on what to do if you’ve been de-banked.)
The FSU has already helped several of its members navigate this process, so if you need our support and advice, please do get in touch via help@freespeechunion.org.
