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Metro Bank tops latest official bank service league table
Metro Bank has topped the second official bank service league table – beating previous winner First Direct.
Since August 2018, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has required banks to publish information on how likely people would be to recommend them – as well as their online and mobile banking, branch and overdraft services – to friends, relatives or other businesses, and they will have to update this information every six months.
The first set of results were published in August, and now Metro Bank has taken the crown in the second set, with 83% of customers saying they'd recommend it to friends and family.
Metro Bank's victory means First Direct, which won the first official poll (as well as every customer service poll MoneySavingExpert.com has done since 2010), has slipped to second place overall, with 82% of customers saying they'd recommend it – although it's still top of the table for online and mobile banking and overdraft services.
Meanwhile RBS has again taken the wooden spoon, after also coming bottom in two of our last three customer service polls.
While 73% of Metro Bank customers said its service was 'great' in the official results, it wasn't included in the results of our latest biannual customer service poll, as it received just 37 votes and we only include banks that get more than 100 votes.
If you're not happy with your bank's service, you could get a free £175 to switch. See our Best Bank Accounts guide for more info.
How did my bank fare?
The independent poll on customer service for banks in Great Britain was conducted between February 2018 and December 2018 by market research company GfK UK Limited.
More than 16,000 current account customers were asked how likely they would be to recommend their provider, their provider's online and app service, overdraft services and service in branch to friends and family. The results show the proportion of customers of each of the largest 16 providers who said they were 'extremely likely' or 'very likely' to recommend each service.
How likely customers are to recommend their bank
| Provider | Overall service | Online and app service | Overdraft service | Branch service |
| Metro Bank | 83% | 81% | 69% | 85% |
| First Direct | 82% | 83% | 77% | N/A (1) |
| Nationwide | 72% | 78% | 63% | 74% |
| Coventry Building Society | 70% | 72% | N/A (2) | 80% |
| Barclays | 64% | 81% | 65% | 66% |
| Yorkshire Bank | 64% | 70% | 56% | 66% |
| Santander | 61% | 75% | 60% | 73% |
| Halifax | 60% | 80% | 54% | 67% |
| Lloyds Bank | 60% | 76% | 57% | 68% |
| NatWest | 59% | 56% | 57% | 62% |
| Bank of Scotland | 58% | 78% | 53% | 68% |
| HSBC | 57% | 73% | 60% | 63% |
| TSB | 52% | 59% | 53% | 68% |
| Co-op Bank | 52% | 64% | 53% | 64% |
| Clydesdale Bank | 51% | 66% | 51% | 60% |
| RBS | 47% | 67% | 51% | 57% |
Approximately 1,000 customers are surveyed per year across Great Britain for every provider with more than 150,000 personal current account customers. Results are only published where at least 100 customers have provided an eligible score for that service in the survey period. (1) First Direct doesn't have a branch network. (2) Fewer than 100 customers provided an eligible score.
New results are released every February and August. You can see more on the results on the GfK website.
There are separate results for Northern Ireland, in which Nationwide topped the overall rankings and First Trust Bank came bottom.
For more on how to switch, see Best Bank Accounts.
What do the banks say?
A Metro Bank spokesperson said: "We are extremely proud to have secured the top spot for our personal current account and maintained our position for our business current account.
"Our offering is simple. We believe in providing the very best in service and convenience for both consumers and businesses, and this latest set of results from the CMA speaks for itself."
An RBS spokesperson said: "We welcome any initiative aimed at improving transparency and comparability between banks' performance on service quality.
"We know we can do more to improve the experience for customers in certain aspects of our service. We're investing in dedicated teams focused on making targeted improvements for customers and rolling out continuous changes to make banking easier, such as our digital AI-powered assistant Cora, or software to help reduce queuing times in branches."
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