Upholding the highest ethical standards and fighting financial crime
Our ambition
Ethics and integrity are the foundation of a prosperous business and society. We’re determined to uphold the highest ethical standards, promote human rights and responsible corporate culture.
“Our ambitious new sustainability strategy reflects the importance that we place on a strong internal culture and ethical standards. Demonstrating this and having the courage to do the right thing, at every level of the business, will enable us to effectively deter, detect and disrupt financial crime.”
John Collins Chief Legal and Regulatory Officer, Santander UK
What this means for us
Corruption, bribery, modern slavery and financial crime erode the value that our business creates and divert precious resources away from the health and growth of our country.
The fair treatment of customers remains at the heart of what we do. We’ll deal with any form of customer fraud as a priority and are committed to raising customer awareness and resilience to any form of financial fraud. Our financial crime strategy seeks to deter, detect and disrupt financial crime, to protect our customers and communities.
Ethical governance and culture
Our commitment to be simple, personal and fair, underpinned by our nine behaviours means the fair treatment of customers is at the heart of what we do.
Workplace culture is very important to all our stakeholders: from our employees and customers to the regulators and investors. We also believe it reflects the values of the company as a whole. We’re focusing on embedding our values in the company culture by:
Focusing
on communicating our purpose and strategy
Ensuring
accountability for behaviour
Supporting
our leaders to lead through transformation
Simplifying
our processes and systems
Responsible supply chain
We want to do business with like-minded companies who share our values and ambition to be a driver of prosperity. We meet the Living Wage requirement for employees of suppliers at our sites in the UK, and our standard supplier contracts include requirements to respect human rights and ethical labour practice based on the principles of the UN Global Compact.
Tackling financial crime, fraud and scams
Our Anti Financial Crime Strategy has a clear mission statement formed around the principles of ‘Deter, Detect and Disrupt’, working to protect our customers and communities. We continually explore the use of new technologies, participating and winning awards as part of an FCA TechSprint event for financial crime.
Collaboration is an essential part of the strategy, and we work both within the bank and with external bodies to ensure alignment and to help identify and address emerging challenges.
We want to give our colleagues the knowledge, skills and environment that empowers them to take the right decisions in order to help protect society from the damage caused by financial crime.
3,000+
colleagues with enhanced financial crime training
20 events
at Santander offices to promote awareness
5,000+
colleagues receive a monthly newsletter
Our impact
Our Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) actively collaborates with law enforcement and industry through the Joint Money Laundering Task Force (JMLIT) as part of our ongoing commitment to deter, detect and disrupt financial crime.
This has contributed to the success of major law enforcement operations, including tackling labour exploitation, as well as greater awareness within our industry of the indicators of modern slavery.
Helping to prevent nearly £38 million of fraud
In 2018, employees in the banking industry helped prevent fraud to the tune of £38 million thanks to the Banking Protocol initiative.
The Banking Protocol is a collaboration between the police, banks and Trading Standards. We’re proud to be part of this initiative, which aims to help vulnerable victims who are in the process of being defrauded of funds from their bank accounts.
£38m
of fraud prevented
4,240
emergency calls
£8,960
of fraud prevented per emergency call, on average