What is Banking Group?
A parent company that owns multiple bank brands. For example, Lloyds Banking Group owns Lloyds, Halifax, and Bank of Scotland. For switch bonus purposes, banks in the same group are treated as the same bank — you can't claim a bonus if you've recently held an account with any brand in the group.
Many UK bank brands that look independent are owned by the same parent company. Lloyds Banking Group owns Lloyds, Halifax and Bank of Scotland; NatWest Group owns NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland and Ulster Bank; HSBC owns First Direct. The brands keep separate apps, branding and account ranges, but sit under one corporate umbrella.
This matters for switch bonuses because eligibility terms are almost always written at group level. A typical condition excludes anyone who has held an account — or received a switch bonus — with any brand in the group within the cooling-off window. Switching from Halifax to Lloyds, for instance, is a switch within Lloyds Banking Group and doesn't qualify for a bonus.
Group structure also affects deposit protection. FSCS cover applies per authorised banking licence, not per brand name, and some brands within a group share a single licence. Where they do, the £120,000 FSCS limit spans every account held across those brands combined.