Lloyds Bank freezes shooter’s accounts over rifle payment

The viewer-submitted recording captures a near hour-long phone call in which the customer attempts to authorise a payment to a registered firearms dealer for a rifle he had bought. A bank staff member asked him to confirm he would not be using the rifle for “unlawful purposes” before the payment could be processed.

When the customer declined to answer, Lloyds froze all of his accounts, including his business accounts. The accounts were subsequently unfrozen. Fieldsports Channel contacted Lloyds Bank, whose spokesperson admitted the staff member had made a mistake. 

Conor O’Gorman, head of policy and campaigns at BASC, said the association would be raising the latest incident directly with Lloyds. “This was an unacceptable overreach,” he told RS, pointing to previous work BASC had carried out with banks and the Financial Conduct Authority to prevent debanking.

Mr O’Gorman added: “From 28 April, new rules will require banks to give customers at least 90 days’ notice before closing an account or ending a payment service, along with a clear written explanation. Those changes are designed to prevent the kind of opaque, unjustified decisions some shooting businesses have faced.”