How your money is protected

As an e-money institution, PPS protects your money through a process known as safeguarding. 

This means that your money is kept separate from PPS’s own money or protected through an insurance policy or similar guarantee.   

Your safeguarded money is not available to any creditors, banks or other third parties. This means that your money will always be available should you ask us to refund your e-money.  

PPS is required to undergo annual independent audits of safeguarding procedures to ensure that your safeguarded money is properly protected.  

Banks are required by the regulators to participate in the Financial Service Compensation Scheme (FSCS). The FSCS acts like an insurance policy for bank accounts and pays out up to a maximum of £85,000 per eligible person, per bank, building society or credit union or up to £170,000 for joint accounts in the event of the bank or building society becoming insolvent. 

E-money issuers are not able to participate in FSCS and therefore your account is not protected by FSCS. In contrast, safeguarding applies to all customers, with no defined limit per customer or account (besides our normal maximum account balance). Which means all your money within your nimbl account is protected. In the very unlikely event of PPS becoming insolvent, the return of your money might take longer than an FSCS claim because the distribution would be handled by an insolvency practitioner or administrator. It’s worth noting that because the administrator can deduct their costs from this money, you might get slightly less than your full account balance back. 

You can head to the FCA’s website to find out more about the main differences between banks and e-money firms here or for more information on safeguarding requirements here.