First Direct - History

History

First Direct was formed on 1 October 1989 by Midland Bank, one of the "Big 4" banks in the UK. The call centre has famously never closed since this date. In 1992, it became a part of HSBC following the acquisition of Midland Bank.

First Direct took its first call on 12.01am on 1 October 1989; more than 1,000 calls were taken within the first 24 hours. The launch of First Direct in 1989 was advertised with different adverts run concurrently on different ITV and Channel 4, one offering a negative view showing the aspects of normal banking and the other a positive view of First Direct.

By May 1991 the bank had 100,000 customers on its books and by March 1993 it had 250,000. It first achieved breakeven in December 1994. In April 1995 the bank gained its 500,000th customer.

The bank began limited trials of Internet Banking in July 1997, launching the service fully in 1998. In May 1999 it launched text message (SMS) banking, a service through which the bank will alert customers by SMS if the balance on their current account goes below a certain amount, and if set, will send weekly mini-statements also by SMS.

In July 2001 the bank's Offset Mortgage was launched.

In January 2004 the bank launched first directory, a service whereby additional services were added to current accounts such as free text message banking, annual travel insurance and mobile phone insurance for a fixed monthly charge. In April 2004 the bank launched Internet Banking Plus, a service whereby account information was taken by third party Internet Banking from the bank's other accounts with different banks and the information was unified under First Direct's Internet Banking Plus service.

The bank has also recently launched a service whereby customers can access accounts via their mobile phone in partnership with MONILINK.

In February 2007, First Direct became the first UK bank to introduce a fee for basic financial transactions, fuelling concern for the future of fee-free banking in the UK for personal customers.