Our Terms of Use

Using our Digital Services outside the UK

UK Residence

The information appearing on our Digital Services is solely intended for use of individuals resident in the United Kingdom. We make no representations that information on our Digital Services is appropriate or available for use in other locations outside of the United Kingdom. Users who access our sites from other locations do so on their own initiative and risk. Some products and services may not be available to all UK residents - for example, we only provide mortgages for properties in Scotland. If in doubt, please contact us for further information.

Outside the UK

Our Digital Services are designed to be used in the UK. If you are using them outside the UK, they may not work in the same way. It is also possible that, depending on where you are accessing our Digital Services from, you could be in breach of local laws. If you are travelling abroad, it is worth checking local laws. We will not be responsible if you breach local laws and suffer a loss. If you have questions about your products whilst you are away, you can phone us.

Our responsibility for loss or damage suffered by you

We are responsible to you for foreseeable loss and damage caused by us. If we fail to comply with these Terms of Use, we are responsible for loss or damage you suffer that is a foreseeable result of our breaking this contract or our failing to use reasonable care and skill, but we are not responsible for any loss or damage that is not foreseeable. Loss or damage is foreseeable if either it is obvious that it will happen or if, at the time the contract was made, both we and you knew it might happen.

We do not exclude or limit in any way our liability to you where it would be unlawful to do so. This includes liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence or the negligence of our employees, agents or subcontractors and liability for failure to perform our Digital Services with reasonable skill and care.

When we are liable for damage to your property. If defective digital content which we have supplied damages a device or digital content belonging to you and this is caused by our failure to use reasonable care and skill, we will either repair the damage or pay you compensation. However, we will not be liable for damage which you could have avoided by following our advice in relation to applying an update offered to you free of charge, or for damage which was caused by you failing to correctly follow installation instructions or to have in place the minimum system requirements advised by us.

You acknowledge that we shall not be responsible for any losses suffered by you as a result of any errors you make when you provide or input instructions in relation to your account(s) in the course of using our Digital Services.

We are not liable for business losses. We only supply our Digital Services for domestic and private use. If you use them for any commercial or business purpose, we will have no liability to you for any loss of profit, loss of business, business interruption, or loss of business opportunity. If you use them for any commercial or business purpose, you acknowledge that we shall not be liable to you for any losses, costs, liabilities or damages suffered or incurred by you as a result of our Digital Services being unavailable for any reason.

Online banking services (SBS Online)

The following sections cover the specific terms applicable to using SBS Online.

Eligibility

Our online banking services are available to existing members (UK private residents aged 16 years or over). New accounts can be opened by customers resident in the UK, aged 16 or over, in sole names only and must not be for commercial or business use.

Products

The savings products we offer on SBS Online can vary, be withdrawn at any time and without notice.

Fees, charges and taxes

We do not charge any fees for using SBS Online. A full list of the current charges that can apply to all savings accounts is available on our website. Depending on your individual tax position, you may have to pay UK income tax on your savings interest.

Withdrawals

You can enable the online withdrawal facilities within SBS Online by providing us with the details of your nominated bank/building society account. This must be a bank/building society account, in your name, operated in the United Kingdom with a valid sort code and bank/building society account number. We will verify these details using a credit reference service. If we are unable to verify your details this way, you will be required to provide proof of ownership of the bank/building society account by providing us with an original, or certified copy, of your bank/building society statement. Our Privacy Notice includes more information about the verification services we use.

We will carry out transactions on your account following instructions you give us or that, in our reasonable opinion, appear to have been authorised by you through SBS Online, including where authentication using your Security Data has been successfully completed.

Withdrawal requests

Minimum withdrawal amount

Unless a transaction is to close an account, the minimum withdrawal amount is £1.

Withdrawal requests received by 2pm on a business working day will be actioned on the same day. Withdrawal requests received after 2pm will be actioned on the next business working day.

We submit all withdrawn funds via electronic payment systems to your nominated bank account. It will normally take one working day for the cleared funds to reach your account, however, we cannot guarantee when a payment will reach you. Full details are available in our Savings Terms and Conditions booklet.

Cancellations

Once you have instructed us to make a withdrawal and your account has been debited, this instruction cannot be cancelled or amended.

Disputed transactions

If a dispute arises between you and us as to whether you instructed a transaction or issued any other instructions on SBS Online you agree that you shall provide us, the police and/or any relevant insurers with all reasonable assistance and co-operation in any investigations carried out in relation to any such dispute.

Security and passwords

During the application process for new products, we will ask you to provide memorable information. Whenever you attempt to access SBS Online, you will be asked to input characters from your memorable information in order to authenticate your identity. You must ensure that you keep your memorable information secret. You should never disclose your memorable info to a third party.

You are responsible at all times for ensuring your password, security details, account number, memorable information and all other customer ID details are kept secret and secure at all times.

If you know or suspect that:

1. any of your login details and memorable information has been disclosed to or is known by a third party; or
2. any third party has sought to gain access to your online account without your authority (“security incidents”), you must immediately notify us. You can email us at savingsonline@scotbs.co.uk or, if you believe that your email address has been compromised, you can contact us on 0333 207 4007 during business hours. Calls may be recorded and/or monitored.

In these circumstances, you acknowledge that we shall be entitled to suspend your SBS Online account(s) immediately and prevent any transactions from being carried out in relation to your account.

You agree to provide us, the police and/or any relevant insurers with all reasonable assistance and co-operation in any investigations carried out in relation to any of the security incidents specified.

Risks with online banking communications

We have taken all reasonable measures to ensure that our communications are secure. You recognise that we cannot guarantee that information and/or communications passing over the internet will remain private and confidential or that such information and/or communications will not be disrupted, intercepted or interfered with. By opening an online savings account with us, you confirm that you accept this risk exists in relation to any information and/or communications passing over the internet in relation to your SBS Online accounts.

Please be wary of using public Wi-Fi. Open Wi-Fi connections can be targeted by fraudsters. To limit the risk to you and us, you should use secure or encrypted Wi-Fi. If you use public Wi-Fi, be extremely vigilant.

Accessibility

SBS Online has been designed to be accessible on a wide range of readily-available IT equipment/devices, software and web browsers. If you are having trouble accessing SBS Online please check that your IT equipment/devices, software and web browsers are configuring correctly to enable you to access SBS Online. For example, please check that you have completed all recent updates. If you have completed all recent updates, it could be that SBS Online will work better in a different browser to the one you are using. If you are still struggling to access, SBS Online please let us know in case we need to investigate the issue.

Keeping Safe

You are responsible for maintaining your own virus protection software and other relevant security software and you will take all reasonable measures to prevent any viruses or any other form of malware from being introduced into SBS Online. This includes updates to devices such as tablets and mobile phones.

Whilst our Digital Services are intended to be available on a continuous basis, they may be unavailable for a wide range of reasons, including but not limited to:

1. technical problems;
2. maintenance;
3. updates;
4. security reasons; and/or
5. other events beyond our reasonable control.

If urgent security and or fraud updates are needed, we will try to do this as soon as possible to keep you safe.

Keeping your details up to date

If there is an issue when you are using our Digital Services we may need to phone you. Please make sure your contact details are up to date. You can update your details by writing to us or by calling 0333 207 4007.

When can we change these Terms of Use?

They can be varied at any time. If we make material changes to our Terms of Use, we will publish details on this website – www.scottishbs.co.uk

For significant changes, we will contact you by email or letter.

To help you understand why we might change our Terms of Use, we’ve given some examples below:

• we make improvements to the Digital Services that benefit you
• we launch an additional Digital Service
• there are changes in technology or security risk and we need to update our Digital Services
• we need to follow a change in regulatory requirements
• if we plan to introduce a charge for any of our Digital Services

There may be other reasons for making a change. If you do not agree with any changes, you can stop using our Digital Services. If you have any questions you can contact us on 0333 207 4007.

Third parties

Third parties do not have rights under these Terms of Use.

If you're unhappy with us

If you think that something has gone wrong, or that we've made a mistake, we want to put things rights. Please get in touch with us if you have any complaints or feedback about our Digital Services. We will try to sort things out as soon as we can.

You can contact your local branch or submit a written complaint to:

The Quality Assurance Manager, Scottish Building Society, SBS House, 193 Dalry Road, Edinburgh, EH11 2EF

We will assess all complaints in accordance with our internal complaints procedure. If you are not satisfied with our response to your complaint, you may refer the matter to the Financial Services Ombudsman Services. Further information about the Financial Services Ombudsman is available online at www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk or by calling 0800 023 4567 or 0300 123 9123.