The British Association for Shooting and Conservation (BASC) says it has been informed of more than two dozen debanking incidents involving at least 15 financial service companies, as reported by GTN columnist Conor O’Gorman in Shooting Times.
Conor reported that a pattern was emerging for Barclays Bank, and that two shooting businesses wanted to share their stories with ST readers.
Northall Clay Pigeon Club in East Sussex had banked with Barclays for many years without any issues, until one day in September they suddenly lost access to their online banking services. It transpired that Barclays had closed their business account. Bank staff asserted that a letter had been sent to the club, though none was reported to have been received. When a copy of this letter was provided, it contained no explanation other than it was a “difficult decision” to make.
Mill Farm Clay Pigeon Club, also in East Sussex, saw their Barclays partnership business account suddenly shut down with no notice in December last year. The first they knew of this was being unable to access online banking.
Northall and Mill Farm clay pigeon clubs have since opened new accounts with Lloyds Bank.
But these are not the only cases. Barclays is sending account holders forms to complete to prove their identity and the activities of their business or club. This can be a very invasive and time-consuming process, and can involve inappropriate threats to close accounts and sudden actual unexplained closures.
Whether Barclays is specifically targeting the shooting sector with these reviews is unclear, but it seems they are clearly not acting fairly and are potentially in breach of existing rules and regulations, based on what BASC has seen. BASC is supporting a number of live cases involving Barclays, and the Financial Ombudsman Service is currently investigating one case.
The Financial Conduct Authority continues its review into banking services and BASC intends to submit further evidence to that.
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