The Central Bank’s primary focus in its supervision of the bank account transfers is on ensuring that these operational issues do not arise in the first place. Nevertheless, given the scale of the transfers, the Central Bank is also putting additional safeguards in place to protect consumers.
The Central Credit Register already includes a month's grace period. This means that, if a single monthly payment is missed, this is not recorded in your credit report.
Given the scale of the account migration exercise from Ulster Bank and KBC, we have issued instructions to lenders to amend the Central Credit Register in the event that more than 1 monthly payment is missed because of operational issues. This means that, if you miss loan repayments through no fault of your own as a result of switching bank accounts, and once the payments are again up to date, this will not show up on your credit report. The amendment will be made to the Central Credit Register by your lender after you have engaged with them.
Where possible, we would encourage you to monitor your loan repayments during the account switching process. If you notice that payments have been missed on your account, you should contact your bank immediately. Once you have told your lender that the issue was due to account switching, and your payments are up to date, they are expected to amend the CCR so that your payment history is unaffected.
This applies even if you yourself are not switching bank accounts. For example, it also covers cases where your employer might be switching accounts, raising the risk of a delay in your salary being deposited, and resulting in your loan or credit card payment being late.