Major change coming to Santander - what it means for customers

A major British bank has announced a change coming for UK customers. Owned by Spanish financial services company, Banco Santander, the account changes are said to be coming into effect in May.

The banks’ 14 million customers have been informed that certain text message alerts services are set to be axed on May 12. Those banking with Santander can currently opt in to receive a variety of alerts via SMS, however, five of these are not set to be withdrawn.

The text alerts being scrapped are when a deposit is made for more than a set amount; when a withdrawal is made for more than a set amount; a weekly balance and transaction round up; and when the customer's balance goes above a set limit or below a set limit.

Customers signed up to receive the texts will stop getting them from the May deadline and will instead have to log in to online banking or the Santander app for information on deposits, withdrawals, account history and bank balances.

There are some exceptions as some text alerts are required - for example any activity on an account that could lead to extra charges being applied to the account. Rules set by Financial watchdog the FCA mean there are, in fact, a number of alerts which will continue.

The types of alerts which will continue to be sent out include messages about when a balance is close to their overdraft limit, when an account has entered the arranged overdraft, when an account enters an unarranged overdraft, insufficient funds for a payment due and a refused payment due to lack of funds.

Santander says less than 1 per cent of its 14million customers rely on its text alert service, amounting to around 140,000 people.

A spokesperson for Santander said: “We have written to customers to advise that, from 12 May 2025, we will be removing five non-regulatory text message alerts from our alerts service. These specific alerts were set-up pre-mobile banking and customers can now obtain a more accurate up-to-date view of their account movements through mobile, online or telephone banking or via push notifications.

“We will continue to send regulatory text message alerts as usual, including notifying customers of any account activity that could lead to additional charges.”

Some banks, such as Nationwide and Royal Bank of Scotland still offer text message updates for mini statements and balances. Others such as Lloyds offer text message updates only for overdraft warnings and in situations such as when fraud is expected.