Who Owns Tesco Bank?

Tesco Bank is split between two owners. Since November 2024 the banking products — credit cards, loans and savings — belong to Barclays, which bought the business and runs it under the Tesco Bank name. Tesco kept the insurance, ATMs and travel money. Companies House still records the Tesco company, Tesco Personal Finance Limited (SC173199), under Tesco’s own holding chain. The consequence for savers is real: Tesco Bank and Barclays deposits now share one FSCS limit. Ownership verified 6 September 2026.

Who owns Tesco Bank?

It depends which product you hold, and this is not a technicality.

• Banking — credit cards, personal loans, savings accounts: sold to Barclays, transferred in November 2024, still branded Tesco Bank under a long-term partnership.
• Insurance, ATMs and travel money: retained by Tesco.

So “Tesco Bank” is now a brand appearing over products owned by two different companies. Nothing on the shopfront or the statement tells you which.

Legal entity and parent group

The Tesco-side company is TESCO PERSONAL FINANCE LIMITED (SC173199), incorporated 5 March 1997 and registered at South Gyle Crescent, Edinburgh — a Scottish company, which surprises people who assume a Tesco business must be registered in England.

Its person with significant control is Tesco Personal Finance Group Limited (SC173198) at 75% or more of shares and votes with the right to appoint and remove directors. Above that sits TESCO PLC (00445790), incorporated 27 November 1947 and previously named Tesco Stores (Holdings) Public Limited Company.

Note that SC173199 is a limited company, not the plc it was — a change consistent with a company that has transferred its banking business away and no longer needs to be a public company to hold deposits.

The banking side is not on this chain at all. Those products sit with Barclays Bank UK PLC (09740322), covered in full on this site’s Barclays profile.

Regulatory status and authorised firm

This is the section that matters financially.

Tesco Bank’s banking products are now provided under Barclays Bank UK PLC‘s authorisation, firm reference number 759676. The FSCS protects £120,000 per person per authorised firm, not per brand — a limit raised from £85,000 on 1 December 2025, with £240,000 on joint accounts.

So a saver holding £120,000 with Tesco Bank and £120,000 with Barclays no longer has £240,000 of protection. They have £120,000, because both sit under one licence. Anyone who spread deposits across the two specifically to double their cover has, since the transfer, been doing the opposite of what they intended.

The transfer was made under a court-approved banking business transfer scheme, so it happened without customers being asked and without accounts being closed and reopened. Tesco’s retained insurance business is separately regulated and is not a deposit-taking activity, so FSCS deposit protection does not apply to it in the same way.

The Financial Services Register, not Companies House, is the authoritative source for who is authorised to hold your money — and it is the one worth checking whenever two brands might share a licence.

Shareholders and controlling interests

No person controls either owner. Tesco PLC is listed on the London Stock Exchange, widely held, and exempt from the PSC regime as a listed company — so Companies House records nothing about who owns Tesco. Barclays PLC is in exactly the same position.

Both are held largely by index managers and institutions on behalf of their funds’ investors. Neither has a shareholder anywhere near the 25% that would register as significant control.

This is a case where the entire ownership question sits above the reach of the UK register on both sides.

Group companies and brands

Tesco owns Tesco, Tesco Express, Tesco Extra, F&F, Clubcard and Tesco Mobile — the last a joint venture with Virgin Media O2, so a Tesco Mobile customer is on O2’s network, another case of a Tesco-branded service that Tesco does not wholly own.

Barclays owns Barclaycard and Barclays Smart Investor alongside the acquired Tesco Bank banking business.

The general lesson is worth stating plainly: a bank brand on a supermarket is rarely a bank the supermarket owns. Sainsbury’s Bank has followed a similar path, with its banking business sold to NatWest. The supermarket banking experiment of the 1990s has largely been unwound, with the brands outliving the ownership.

Sources and verification

The company numbers, the 1997 incorporation, the Tesco Personal Finance Group PSC entry and Tesco PLC’s 1947 incorporation and previous name are Companies House records, checkable by number. The 759676 authorisation is on the Financial Services Register.

Two limits. Companies House records nothing about who owns Tesco PLC or Barclays PLC, because both are listed and exempt — the absence of a PSC entry reflects the statute, not secrecy. And the split of the business between Barclays and Tesco is established by the 2024 transaction announcements and the transfer scheme, not by any single register entry: no Companies House page shows you that your Tesco Bank credit card is a Barclays product. Companies House does not verify most filed information.