Santander bank — Santander had the most banking problems per customer, and was the most-complained about on investments and mortgages, says the FCA. Photograph: Graham Turner for the Guardian

Santander tops bank complaints list

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Head of new Financial Conduct Authority says complaints data helps consumers and boosts competition

Santander has been named as the most complained about bank by the new Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). The Spanish-owned bank, which is advertising its 123 current account heavily at the moment, was the subject of four complaints for every one of its 1,000 banking customers during the second half of last year.

Overall, Santander had the fifth-largest number of complaints to the regulator, but the most banking problems per customer. On investments, it was the most-complained about firm with 2,236 complaints, and also received the most mortgage complaints, 14,080.

Barclays topped the new financial regulator's figures in terms of the gross number of complaints, including banking, insurance, payment protection insurance (PPI) and other issues.

The FCA, which has just taken over from the Financial Services Authority, said that in total there were almost 3.5m complaints about financial service firms during the six months to the end of 2012 with 2.1m about mis-sold PPI. The figure was 1% higher than the first half of the year as the number of PPI complaints climbed by 5%.

There was some better news for pure banking customers. Complaints about current accounts fell 6% while problems with insurance rose by the same amount.

The figures show that Barclays was the subject of 414,302 complaints to the FSA, which is down 6% since the first half of 2012. Lloyds TSB had 349,386 (down 19%), Bank of Scotland/Halifax: 338,912 (down 7%) while Santander received 237,923 (down 1%). The card provider MBNA received a large number of complaints – 270,486 (a drop of 3%).

FCA chief executive Martin Wheatley says: "Greater transparency drives greater competition, and the publication of the complaints data lays bare the track record of the UK's financial institutions when it comes to resolving customer conflicts.

"When I meet the bosses of the financial institutions they frequently tell me they do not want to be at the top of the table, which means they strive to improve both their sales and complaints handling processes.

"Not only does our data help consumers compare and contrast their current bank or lender, it also boosts competition among firms."

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