Banks

Banks made more credit available to households and small businesses this summer but have warned the eurozone crisis may hit future lending.

Barclays was the most complained-about bank during the first half of the year, figures from the regulator today show.

Banks should separate their investment and retail arms to help prevent a future financial crisis, the Independent Commission on Banking (ICB) said today.

Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) gripes boosted the number of complaints made to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) in the first half of 2011 by a massive 54%, compared to the amount of cases in the second half of 2010.

Some big UK banks, including HSBC, have failed to hit an extended deadline to clear their backlog of Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) misselling complaints.

Thousands of homeowners are to be warned by taxpayer-owned banks to forget renewing their subscription to Sky TV or buying a new iPhone and instead focus on paying their mortgage.

Santander is still comfortably the worst bank account provider for customer service, according to a poll of MoneySavingExpert.com users, despite claims it had cleaned up its act.

Savers need to be quick to get the market's top easy-access cash Isa, as from Monday it'll be gone.

Taxpayer-backed Lloyds Banking Group has become the latest bank to announce a hit to its financial performance due to compensation payouts for mis-sold payment protection insurance (PPI).

Barclays reported a 33% drop in half-year profits to £2.6 billion after it took a £1 billion hit to cover compensation for customers who were mis-sold payment protection insurance.