Intelligent Finance

This article was nominated for deletion. The discussion was closed on 21 December 2023 with a consensus to merge the content into the article Bank of Scotland. If you find that such action has not been taken promptly, please consider assisting in the merger instead of re-nominating the article for deletion. To discuss the merger, please use the destination article's talk page. (December 2023)

|

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.
Find sources: "Intelligent Finance" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (May 2016) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

|

Bank of Scotland plc trading as Intelligent Finance

Trade name

| Intelligent Finance
Company type| Division
Industry| Finance
Founded| 1999; 25 years ago (1999)
Products| Financial services

Number of employees

| 287 Scotland
Parent| Lloyds Banking Group
Website| www.if.com

Intelligent Finance (IF) is a UK offset bank, a division of Bank of Scotland plc which is part of Lloyds Banking Group. It was established as a division of Halifax plc in 1999 by Jim Spowart, who helped establish other direct financial services firms including Direct Line.

Following a reorganisation of the HBOS group, it is now a division of Bank of Scotland plc. IF's registered headquarters are in Edinburgh, with customer service operations based in Scotland (Livingston, West Lothian, and Rosyth, Fife). Its postal address is no longer in Livingston; it is now Leeds.

IF was set up at a time when many banks were exploring opportunities to use new technology to reduce the costs of providing financial services. IF established what it marketed as "intelligent" products whereby customer pick a combination of all or some of a range of bank accounts including current account, savings account, mortgage and credit card. The credit balance in a person's current account and saving accounts would "offset" any debit balances in the person's mortgage and credit card accounts. The customer would then pay interest on the net balance, potentially allowing savings to be made on borrowings. However, in June 2005 IF withdrew its offset credit card, citing high running costs.

Although the bank was hit by technical problems at its launch, it quickly gained a significant market share in the mortgage and current account market, and is still one of the largest in the U.K

Intelligent Finance sponsored the Scottish First Division football team Livingston FC. From 2006 to 2008 it sponsored the if.comedies award, successor to the Perrier Comedy Award, at the Edinburgh Fringe.

In July 2009, Intelligent Finance withdrew its mortgage and current account products to new customers, although existing customers were unaffected. In March 2013, Intelligent Finance withdrew all its remaining products to new customers. As with mortgages, existing customers continued to be able to operate their accounts. Its Visa Debit cards do not support contactless payment and cannot be added to smartphone near-field communication applications (NFC, e.g. Samsung Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay.

In Summer 2014, Intelligent Finance asked its savings customers to consider moving their accounts to TSB Bank. Lloyds Banking Group was asked to close Intelligent Finance to new business by the European Commission in order to reduce their market share.[1]

In May 2023, Intelligent Finance announced, without explanation and without any mention on its website, that it would be closing all its current accounts by the end of 2023 and that customers would have to switch to a new current account or have their funds returned to them.[2]

## References

[edit]

1. ^ "MyIF.com". Archived from the original on 6 February 2015. Retrieved 30 April 2024.
2. ^ "Leicester Mercury". Archived from the original on 6 June 2023. Retrieved 30 April 2024.

## External links

[edit]

* Banks portal

* Official website

* v
* t
* e

Lloyds Banking Group

Retail|

* Lloyds Bank
* Lloyds Bank International
* Bank of Scotland
* Halifax
* Birmingham Midshires
* St James's Place Bank
* Schroders Personal Wealth
* Halifax Share Dealing

Commercial|

* Agricultural Mortgage Corporation
* Lloyds Bank Corporate Markets
* Lloyds Development Capital

Consumer|

* Black Horse
* Colleys (surveyors)
* Lex Autolease
* MBNA

Insurance|

* Lloyds Bank General Insurance (underwriter)
* Lloyds Bank Insurance Services (intermediary)
* Scottish Widows

Former|

| Lloyds TSB|

* Bank of London and Montreal
* Bank of London and South America
* Capital and Counties Bank
* Cheltenham & Gloucester
* Cox & Kings
* Cunliffe, Brooks
* Fox, Fowler and Company
* Hart, Fellow's and Company
* Hill Samuel
* Lewis's Bank
* Lloyds and National Provincial Foreign Bank
* Lloyds Associated Banking Company
* Lloyds Bank California
* Lloyds Bank Canada
* National Bank of New Zealand
* Porterbrook
* Trustee Savings Bank
* TSB Bank

|

HBOS|

* Bank of Wales
* Bankwest
* British Linen Bank
* Banco Halifax Hispania
* Bank of Scotland International
* Clerical Medical
* Halifax (Ireland)
* Intelligent Finance
* The Leeds
* Sainsbury's Bank

Legislation|

* Lloyds TSB Act 1998
* HBOS Group Reorganisation Act 2006

Other|

* Lloyds Bank RFC
* Museum on the Mound

* Category
* Commons

* v
* t
* e

Commercial and retail banks in the United Kingdom

Banking in the United Kingdom

Barclays|

* Barclays Bank
* Barclays Wealth

HSBC Holdings|

* First Direct
* HSBC UK Bank
* HSBC Private Bank
* M&S Bank

Lloyds Banking Group|

* Bank of Scotland
* Birmingham Midshires
* Halifax
* Lloyds Bank

NatWest Group1|

* NatWest
* Coutts & Co.
* Royal Bank of Scotland
* Messrs. Drummond
* Holt's Military Banking
* Ulster Bank
* Isle of Man Bank

Santander Group|

* Cahoot
* Cater Allen
* Santander UK

Wholly state-owned|

* National Savings and Investments
* UK Government Investments
* UK Asset Resolution

Challenger banks|

* Atom Bank
* Monzo
* Starling Bank
* Tandem Bank
* Zopa

Other retail|

* Al Rayan Bank
* Aldermore
* AIB Group (UK)
* Allied Irish Bank (GB)
* AIB (NI)
* Bank of Ireland
* Chase
* The Co-operative Bank
* Smile
* Danske Bank
* easyMoney
* Handelsbanken
* Hodge Bank
* Kent Reliance
* Kingdom Bank
* Metro Bank
* Paragon
* Reliance Bank
* Secure Trust Bank
* Sainsbury's Bank
* Shawbrook Bank
* Standard Chartered
* Tesco Bank
* Triodos Bank
* TSB Bank
* Unity Trust Bank
* Virgin Money
* Clydesdale Bank
* Yorkshire Bank
* Wesleyan Bank

Other commercial
and private|

* Arbuthnot Latham & Co
* Bank and Clients
* Butterfield Bank
* C. Hoare & Co
* Cambridge & Counties Bank
* Close Brothers Group
* Duncan Lawrie
* J.P. Morgan
* Kleinwort Hambros
* Rothschild & Co
* Weatherbys

* Big Four banks are underlined and private banks are shown in italics
* 1 Partially owned by UK Government Investments

* v
* t
* e

Banks of Scotland

Present|

* Bank of Scotland
* Clydesdale Bank
* Royal Bank of Scotland
* Sainsbury's Bank
* Tesco Bank
* TSB Bank

Past|

* Adam and Company
* Airdrie Savings Bank
* British Linen Bank
* City of Glasgow Bank
* Commercial Bank of Scotland
* Douglas, Heron & Company
* Glasgow and Ship Bank
* Leith Banking Company
* National Bank of Scotland
* National Commercial Bank of Scotland

Notes|

* Banknotes of Scotland
* Banknotes of the pound sterling

See also|

* Chartered Institute of Bankers in Scotland
* Scottish bankers

Scotland portal

This article about a company of Scotland is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

|

* v
* t
* e

This European bank or insurance-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

|

* v
* t
* e

*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template