If a UK financial services firm is unable, or likely to be unable, to pay claims against it you may be able to get compensation from the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). The service is free to customers and is independent from financial services firms. It is funded by levies charged to the financial services industry.

The FSCS covers business conducted by firms authorised by us. You can check if a firm is authorised by us on Check our Register.

If you have a complaint or claim against an authorised firm that is still trading, you should contact that firm directly – see If things go wrong.

If you have a claim against a firm that has stopped trading you should first try to contact the firm to see if it can pay your claim. If the firm cannot pay claims against it, the FSCS may be able to help.

The FSCS covers:

For further information see the FSCS booklet A guide to the work of the Financial Services Compensation Scheme on the FSCS website.

The FSCS can help:

Different rules and compensation limits apply depending on what the claim is for. From 1 January 2010 certain limits have been changed. The FSCS cannot always cover 100% of your loss and can only pay compensation for financial loss. If you owe money to the failed firm (for example loans, mortgage or credit card debts), these will be taken into account before any compensation is paid. The limits are for one person’s claim against one authorised firm for each type of claim. So you are only covered up to the limit once for each type of claim against a particular firm, no matter how many products are affected. For more details see the FSCS website.

Provided you meet all the conditions to qualify for compensation, the FSCS will pay you compensation up to the limit. You may also receive a further payment, or payments, of your share of any money left in the failed firm. This money will not necessarily cover all of your loss, and it is not possible to say in advance how much you might receive or when. This will depend on how much money was left in the firm when it failed and how that money is allocated.

By law, most financial services firms must be regulated by us to do business that we regulate in the UK. Our Register has information on all regulated firms currently doing business in the UK. The Register includes firms that are UK authorised as well as those authorised in another European Economic Area (EEA) state that also conduct business in the UK.

If you are considering or currently doing business with a firm authorised in another EEA state you should ask for further information from the firm or its UK branch about its compensation arrangements. This is because the compensation arrangements for these firms may differ to those for a UK authorised firm.

Where another EEA state’s scheme has a lower level of protection than the FSCS, an EEA firm operating in the UK can choose to 'top up' into the FSCS. For further information on this and to find out if your firm has 'topped up', please see the FSCS website.

The top-up arrangements can be withdrawn if the level of protection in another EEA scheme becomes greater than FSCS protection. If so, the firm will tell you about the change.

Financial services firms may ‘pool’ your money along with their other clients’ money, commonly known as client accounts or pooled accounts. They may do this so that they can buy investments, such as shares or other investments on your behalf.

The FSCS protection for client or other pooled accounts, held with an authorised deposit taker, will depend on the way the monies are held.

Where a solicitor or stockbroker has a client account with a bank that holds mixed client funds, and the bank or building society is aware that the funds held in that account are client monies, the clients whose funds are held on that account would be eligible for compensation from the FSCS.

To qualify for FSCS cover, the following conditions need to be met:

For other types of pooled account, the situation can be more complex. In these situations you should speak to the person or firm responsible for holding your money to find out exactly what arrangements are in place.

Many deposit-taking firms operate using different trading names which are not separately authorised by us. You may find that you have deposits with different banks but they are actually linked and operate under one single authorisation. This would mean that you are only covered up to a total of £50,000. This table lists the largest UK deposit takers and how they are authorised by us. It shows how the FSCS limits would apply for most customer accounts – it is not a complete list of deposit takers covered by the FSCS.

The FSCS has answers to frequently asked questions on its website.