Dean Wiseman, 59, had been a Barclays customer for more than 30 years. In February, Wiseman, who lives in Christchurch, New Zealand, had a letter from the bank telling him that his account would be closed in seven months.

Wiseman is one of thousands of expats who have lost their bank accounts over the past few years. High street banks including Lloyds, Barclays and TSB have been closing accounts of some customers living abroad, particularly since Brexit.

About 4.7 million people born in Britain were estimated to be living abroad in 2020, according to the UN, and about 784,900 British citizens lived in the EU, excluding Ireland, in 2017.

Wiseman has dual UK and New Zealand citizenship. He owns a flat in Poplar, east London, which he rents out, with the tenant paying £1,400 a month into his UK bank account, which he also uses to pay tax.

“I’m probably just a number to the bank, but it had an impact on me. I thought I was going to have to sell the flat, which was really stressful. I like having a connection to the UK and I wasn’t sure what I would do if I couldn’t sell the flat or find a new bank account by the deadline,” he said.

Wiseman struggled to open a new UK or international bank account. In May he spent 12 hours on the phone and contacted 16 of the largest high street banks and building societies. Each told him that he couldn’t open a bank account from abroad or was ineligible for international banking services.

Eventually he realised that he could use an account he had already opened with the money transfer firm Wise to accept payments in sterling without needing to pay currency exchange or banking fees.

“After lots of stressful sleepless nights and hours on the phone I have landed on my feet,” Wiseman said.

Barclays said: “As a ring-fenced bank, our Barclays UK products are designed for customers within the UK. We will no longer be offering personal current or savings accounts to retail customers with addresses registered with us outside the UK, subject to limited exceptions. This customer was given six months’ notice of this decision before account closure and information explaining the steps they needed to take.” 

Existing customers will also not be able to remortgage with the bank if they are based outside the UK.

Financial services firms lost “passporting” rights to operate in the EU after Brexit which means that they can no longer legally serve customers unless they have specific banking licences from each European country.

In 2020 Lloyds, which owns Halifax and the Royal Bank of Scotland, wrote to 13,000 customers living in the Netherlands, Slovakia, Portugal, Ireland and Germany to tell them that their bank accounts would be closed. TSB wrote to some overseas customers in April 2021 to say the same thing.

Banks have also started closing accounts for customers who live further afield. “The current wave of account closures has nothing to do with Brexit,” said Martyn James, a consumer rights campaigner. “I suspect that keeping these accounts open is not worth the money or hassle for banks, but it leaves some customers in an incredibly difficult position. People might want to keep one foot in the UK while working abroad and may be using a UK bank account to get pension payments.”

About 343,350 bank accounts were closed by banks and building societies in the 2021-22 tax year, because of concerns about financial crime, according to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the City regulator, up from 72,700 in 2017-18. Expats were the group most likely to be affected by closures, it said in September.

“Banks have to make sure they have secure systems to detect fraud and money laundering, but they should not do that at the expense of meeting customer needs,” said James Daley from the campaign group Fairer Finance. “There are a growing number of people with relatively complex affairs who need to be served. Under current rules banks are allowed to exclude large swathes of customers.”

What can you do?

Banks are free to decide whether to provide banking services to customers outside the UK. Consumers are supposed to be treated fairly and be given adequate notice if an account is closed, the FCA said. “Banks may set their own requirements on country of residence for account holders and must comply with local law and regulation when serving customers outside the UK.”

If you want to make a complaint, contact your bank or building society directly. If you have not heard back after eight weeks or you are dissatisfied with the response you can take the complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service, which can award compensation.

The Financial Ombudsman Service had 1,389 complaints about bank account closures in the 2022-23 tax year and 25 per cent were upheld.

If you move abroad some banks will allow you to keep using your UK account if you still have a UK address. Some banks offer international accounts but these normally have strict eligibility criteria and come with fees.

To open an international account with Lloyds you need an income of £50,000 a year or an initial deposit of £25,000. For a Barclays international account you need to deposit £100,000 across your accounts with the bank. For an HSBC expat account you have to save or invest £50,000 or have a salary of more than £100,000 a year.

Wise allows customers to set up an account which can accept and send multiple currencies. However, it is not a bank, which means your money is not protected by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, which insures bank deposits up to £85,000.