Our commitments

The banking and finance sector employs hundreds of thousands of people across the UK and provides services to millions of customers every day. As an industry it is vital that we represent all of the communities we serve, that we treat people equally and fairly in everything that we do and that we never let discrimination and injustice go unchallenged.

We have seen many people from across the country come together in recent weeks to protest against the racial injustice and inequality that still exists in our society and to call for urgent action and change.

As a body representing banking and finance and all those who work in our industry, UK Finance has a responsibility to condemn racial inequality and discrimination in all its forms and to help deliver meaningful action in creating equality for all.

In recent years our industry has worked together to improve the culture in banking and finance and to focus on the customers, colleagues and communities that we serve. But it is clear that there is still more to do to improve diversity and inclusion.

At UK Finance it is our role to work with others in promoting and raising standards across the industry. Over the coming weeks and months, we are committing to work with our members to identify the actions needed to address inequality in the industry and to promote and support effective initiatives that prevent discrimination.

This includes ensuring we are doing we can as an employer as well. We will review our own internal policies to ensure equality of opportunity. We will strengthen support for our black and ethnic minority colleagues and education for all our staff. And, continue to work to make sure black and ethnic minority voices are represented at every level of our organisation.

As our industry plays its part in the country’s economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, we have an opportunity to put improved values, culture, diversity and representation in business and across society at the heart of our efforts. It’s essential that we challenge ourselves to do so and we must invest now to drive this change.

At UK Finance we are committed to building and promoting a diverse and inclusive working environment for all colleagues - one where difference is welcomed and diverse views, ideas and perspectives are sought and valued.

We recognise that diversity drives innovation, creativity, and originality, and equips us to most effectively represent and meet the needs of our members and their customers.

At the heart of our inclusion strategy are the following core objectives:

Building and maintaining an inclusive environment: working with colleagues to build the skills, understanding and culture to ensure an inclusive working environment. By fostering understanding and enhancing knowledge we will provide colleagues with the tools and opportunities to thrive.

Building a diverse workforce: ensuring we have the right processes, tools, recruitment and selection approaches in place to recruit a diverse and talented workforce that delivers the skills and experience needed for the business.

Living these objectives: ensuring that colleagues are able to bring their true self to work and feel supported and encouraged through a working environment that is open, diverse, inclusive and welcoming to all.

To support the work that we are doing to build a balanced business we have:

• set up a colleague-led diversity and inclusion network
• appointed internal diversity champions
• set out clear diversity and inclusion objectives and priorities
• adopted 'blind' recruitment practices

We report on our progress regularly to our Board and each objective is also supported by a detailed action plan.

An overview of some of our inclusion initiatives

Gender

• We are a signatory to the HM Treasury Women in Finance charter and we are on track to meet our commitment to have 50 per cent of women in senior roles by January 2023.
• We have set internal targets for gender diversity in our senior management team.
• We have appointed a member of our senior executive team to be responsible and accountable for gender diversity and inclusion.
• The pay of the senior executive team is linked to delivery against these internal targets on gender diversity.
• We undertake voluntary gender pay gap reporting, the results of which are shared with our colleagues.

Ethnic background

• We have set internal targets for ethnic diversity representation at senior level and we aim to be representative of wider UK society as a whole at all levels of our business.
• We have begun publishing internally regular 'Who I Am' pieces by colleagues as we know that dialogue promotes openness and understanding around these issues.
• We undertake voluntary ethnicity pay gap reporting, the results of which are shared with our colleagues.
• We are signatories of the Business in the Community 'Race at Work Charter' which sets out our public commitment to improve outcomes for black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) employees in the UK.

Sexual orientation

• We have reviewed the language/options of our Company policies and benefits in order to ensure that no colleague is unintentionally excluded.

Wellbeing

• We provide a generous package of colleague benefits that are focused on supporting health and wellbeing.
• We run regular health and wellbeing webinars which are open to all colleagues.
• All colleagues have access to trained counsellors and a virtual GP service.
• Mental health first aiders onsite, trained to support colleagues day-to-day and to signpost appropriate support, both in and outside of the workplace.
• We are a member of the Living Wage Foundation, the independent movement of organisations, businesses and people campaigning for a real living wage based on the cost of living, not just the government determined minimum wage.

Parents and carers

• We offer generous maternity, paternity and shared parental leave pay.
• We have a range of policies in place to support all colleagues with caring responsibilities.
• We offer access to online live and on demand information resources and support networks.
• We support flexible working.

Criminals often try to impersonate genuine companies in their scams. This can include banks and other financial institutions, as well as UK Finance.  

We do not offer any financial products. Anyone claiming to provide such products on our behalf is fraudulent.  

Criminals may also try to use our official branding on their websites, social media posts, emails or other literature to pretend they are legitimate. We do not provide endorsement or approval for any products or services.  

We would never call or text anyone, especially not to request payments. 

Current scams

We are aware of a potential scam involving people being offered loans for an upfront fee by an individual posing as a representative of UK Finance. We do not offer any financial products and any claiming to provide these on our behalf is fraudulent.

If you think you may have fallen for a scam, please contact your bank immediately and report it to Action Fraud. 

Staying safe

Criminals are experts at impersonating people, organisations and the police. They spend hours researching you for their scams, hoping you’ll let your guard down for just a moment. Stop and think. It could protect you and your money. 

To help you stay safe, follow the advice of our Take Five to Stop Fraud campaign: 

STOP: 
Taking a moment to stop and think before parting with your money or information could keep you safe. 

CHALLENGE: 
Could it be fake? It’s ok to reject, refuse or ignore any requests. Only criminals will try to rush or panic you. 

PROTECT: 
Contact your bank immediately if you think you’ve fallen for a scam and report it to Action Fraud. If you are in Scotland, please report to Police Scotland directly by calling 101 or Advice Direct Scotland on 0808 164 6000. 

Always Remember 

Only give out your personal or financial information to services you have consented to and are expecting to be contacted by. 

Contact your bank or an organisation directly using a known email or phone number. 

Don’t give anyone remote access to your computer following a cold call or unsolicited text. 

You can also forward suspicious emails to report@phishing.gov.uk and suspected scam texts to your mobile network provider by forwarding them to 7726. An easy way to remember 7726 is that they are the numbers on your telephone keypad that spell out the word ‘SPAM’. 

We are pleased to announce the renewal of our ISO 27001 certification, a standard we've proudly maintained since 2019.

This consistent re-accreditation validates the strength and maturity of our Information Security Management System (ISMS). For our members and stakeholders, this offers continuous, certified assurance that your data is managed with the utmost security, built on a foundation of international best practice over many years.

Details on the ISO 27001 standard can be found on the BSI website.

Link to certificate

As a London Living Wage employer, UK Finance is proud to be a supporter of the Living Wage Foundation, the independent movement of organisations, businesses and people campaigning for a real living wage based on the cost of living, not just the government determined minimum wage.

This statement sets out the steps that UK Finance has taken and is continuing to take to ensure that modern slavery or human trafficking is not taking place within our business operations or our supply chain.

Link to statement

UK Finance appreciates the investigative work into security vulnerabilities which is carried out by well-intentioned, ethical security researchers.

Our Promise

We are committed to thoroughly investigating, understanding and resolving security issues across our websites in collaboration with the security community.

Scope

If you believe you have found a security issue in any platform or service owned or operated by UK Finance, we encourage you to notify us.

How to Notify Us

To submit a vulnerability report to UK Finance, please contact us at security@ukfinance.org.uk. Your submission will be reviewed and validated by a member of our security team. When reporting a security issue, please:

• Provide detailed reports with reproducible steps and a clearly defined impact.
• Submit one vulnerability per report.
• Social engineering (e.g. phishing, vishing, smishing) is prohibited.

Safe Harbour

UK Finance supports safe harbour for security researchers who:

• Make a good faith effort to avoid privacy violations, destruction of data, and interruption or degradation of our services.
• Only interact with accounts you own or with explicit permission of the account holder. If you do encounter Personally Identifiable Information (PII) contact us immediately, do not proceed with access, and immediately purge any local information.
• Provide us with a reasonable amount of time to resolve vulnerabilities prior to any disclosure to the public or a third-party.

We will consider activities conducted consistent with this policy to constitute "authorised" conduct and will not pursue civil action or initiate a complaint to law enforcement. We will help to the extent we can if legal action is initiated by a third-party against you.

Please submit a report to us before engaging in conduct that may be inconsistent with or unaddressed by this policy.

You should not:

• Access unnecessary amounts of data. For example, two or three records is enough to demonstrate most vulnerabilities (such as an enumeration or direct object reference vulnerability);
• Violate the privacy of UK Finance users, staff, contractors, systems etc. For example by sharing, redistributing and/or not properly securing data retrieved from our systems or services;
• Communicate any vulnerabilities or associated details via methods not described in this policy or with anyone other than the dedicated UK Finance security team;
• Modify data in our systems/services which is not your own;
• Disrupt our service(s) and/or systems; or
• Disclose any vulnerabilities in UK Finance systems/services to third-parties/the public prior to UK Finance confirming that those vulnerabilities have been mitigated or rectified. This does not prevent notification of a vulnerability to third-parties to whom the vulnerability is directly relevant, for example where the vulnerability being reported is in a software library or framework - but details of the specific vulnerability of UK Finance must not be referenced in such reports. If you are unsure about the status of a third-party to whom you wish to send notification, please email security@ukfinance.org.uk for clarification.

We request that any and all data retrieved during research is securely deleted as soon as it is no longer required and at most, one month after the vulnerability is resolved, whichever occurs soonest.

If you are unsure at any stage whether the actions you are thinking of taking are acceptable, please contact our security team for guidance (please do not include any sensitive information in the initial communications)

This policy is designed to be compatible with common good practice among well-intentioned security researchers. It does not give you permission to act in any manner that is inconsistent with the law or cause UK Finance to be in breach of any of its legal obligations, including but not limited to:

• The Computer Misuse Act (1990)
• The General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018
• The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act (1988)

You can read the UK Finance Sustainability Supplier Charter here.

Progress is being made under the HM Treasury Women in Finance target.

A balanced and diverse workforce is good for business, helping create fairer and more inclusive working environments which boost creativity and productivity, ultimately better serving everyone from customers to shareholders. Recognising this, UK Finance, the body that represents more than 300 of the leading firms providing finance, banking, markets and payments-related services in or from the UK, is a signatory to the HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter.

The Women in Finance Charter is a commitment by HM Treasury and signatory firms to work together to build a more balanced and fair financial services industry. The Charter was introduced following the 'Empowering Productivity' report into harnessing the talents of women in finance.

The core Charter pledges for promoting gender diversity comprise:

• Having one member of our senior executive team who is responsible and accountable for gender diversity and inclusion
• Setting internal targets for gender diversity in our senior management
• Publishing progress annually against these targets in reports on our website
• Having an intention to ensure the pay of the senior executive team is linked to delivery against these internal targets on gender diversity

In signing up to the Charter in November 2017, following discussion within our Board, we set ourselves the target of achieving 40 per cent female representation within senior management over three years. We are delighted that we have now met this initial target and we are now looking ahead and focusing on achieving gender parity by 31 December 2026. To date we have made excellent progress towards this target which is supported by current gender equality across our organisation within middle management and more junior posts.

David Postings, Chief Executive of UK Finance said:

Having a diverse and inclusive culture in financial services brings enormous benefits to employees, firms and society as a whole. The HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter industry is a key element of the industry’s action to ensure the workforce reflects the customers and communities that it serves. UK Finance is a proud supporter and we are pleased that we now have 39 per cent female representation at senior level.

UK Finance aims to attract outstanding and diverse talent to operate in a collegiate and collaborative environment. We see our commitment under the Women in Finance Charter as symbolic of the balanced and inclusive working environment needed to succeed in financial services.

We see our commitment to the Charter as emblematic of the support within financial services for the advancement of women in senior management positions and, more generally, policies intended to deliver a more equal, inclusive and diverse workplace.

In addition to putting in place policies to meet and support our core pledges, we have also committed to promoting the adoption of the Charter across the financial services industry. We are also supporters of he Investing in Women Code and represent the industry on the Investing in Women board.