Veteran Spanish bank Santander’s UK subsidiary already has a strong retail banking foothold in the country. In June 2017, Santander UK expanded its offering by launching a private banking service, aimed at building holistic relationships with its clients. Vania Goncalves speaks to Charlotte Platts, head of Santander Private, and James Dunne, head of digital investing at Santander UK
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By GlobalDataWith around 14m active customers, approximately 20,000 employees, 841 branches and 67 regional corporate business centres at the end of 2016, Santander UK is a dominant player in the UK retail banking space. In June 2017, Santander UK added another feather to its cap by foraying into private banking in the country.
With the launch of Santander Private, the bank will provide banking and wealth management services to private clients, business owners and entrepreneurs.
Santander Private offers day-to-day banking, lending, and investment services, as well as financial planning products to clients with investments and savings of over £500,000 or an annual income of more than £250,000.
The decision to create this private offering was based on the needs of Santander UK’s clients, according to Charlotte Platts, head of Santander Private.
“It is a decision based on the needs of our customers, rather than anything else in the market place. It is just the desire to provide the best service we can to our existing customers.
“We are aiming to build a holistic relationship with the client and deliver that through whatever channel they prefer.”
Platts says that the success of Santander Select has played a significant role in the launch of Santander Private. The Santander Select offering, available to clients with £75,000 invested or deposited with the bank or an income of at least £5,000 per month or a property worth at least £500,000 with a Santander mortgage, serves the mass affluent segment and is continually expanding its proposition. In the last 12 months 60,000 new customers joined the Santander Select offering, according to Platts.
“This is quite a broad segment that we are serving and serving it well through digital, telephony and face to face in branch with Select advisors.
“What we found was that the top-end of that segment is made of those that have more money with us, are loyal and want to look at a bit more of an in-depth service and complexity in their day-to-day banking needs,” she adds.
Besides having access to digital online banking services and getting support from Santander’s specialist 24/7 contact centres, Santander Private clients will have access to 40 relationship managers (RMs). “The 40 bankers are spread throughout the UK, working closely with our major branches and the corporate sector.”
“Each customer gets a dedicated private banker to look at their needs all-round — whether that is lending, deposits, or investment related. As the opportunity grows and we gain more clients, we will need more bankers,” says Platts.
According to Platts, the new private service offers some bespoke mortgage products and a few small flexes in mortgage policy, “particularly aimed at emerging wealth and business owners”, as well as investment funds from Santander Asset Management, which is present across ten countries.
There are plans to create a “more bespoke current account” dedicated to Santander Private alongside enhancing its investment proposition. In addition, plans are in place to launch a robo-advisory solution towards the back end of this year.
Platts recognises that digitalisation might be a challenge for many banks, but acknowledges that is not the case for Santander Private. According to Platts, digital is being embraced as an “enabler” for the Santander Private business.
Clients of Santander Private will benefit from the new World Elite MasterCard product — which is available to Santander Select customers as well. The credit card is designed to offer travel benefits to clients wherever they are in the world.
“Our customers are generally quite well travelled, so the travel insurance discount, the airport lounge access and the worldwide Wi-Fi offer makes that appropriate to this client segment.”
Clients of Santander Private will also have access to the Santander Investment Hub.
James Dunne, head of digital investing at Santander UK, who is responsible for the Investment Hub, explains: “More and more people want to engage with their investments nowadays and so charlotte and I work really closely together so that when her customers take advise through the private banking team, and purchase funds, they are instantly given access to the Investment Hub. What it means is that they can enjoy this more dynamic relationship with their investments — whether that is via the mobile, tablet or desktop.
“They can check on the performance of their funds, buy and sell other funds, and bring funds from other platforms. They can have one single view of their holdings with Santander. What we hear from all of our customers is that they like that aggregated view of all of their financial needs and that is why it is becoming increasingly relevant to have that dynamic relationship and ensure that customers can see everything in one place.”
Platts adds: “The fact that our clients can see all their assets via the Investment Hub with their online banking in one place is certainly what a private bank of the future looks like.”
With £15 per month, the new World Elite Mastercard offers:
- Unlimited airport lounge access at over 800 lounges with LoungeKey
- Access to over 1 million Wi-Fi hotspots worldwide with Boingo
- A 40% online discount on Santander Travel Insurance
- Mastercard Concierge available to you 24 hours a day 7 days a week when using your card (fees and charges may apply)
- No foreign transaction fees on purchases or cash withdrawals made abroad when using the local currency option
- 5% cashback on purchases (on maximum spend of £3,000 per month)
- 0% on purchases and balance transfers for 18 months from the date of account opening, with no balance transfer fee to pay
