Rhiannon PhilpsMany or all of the products and brands we review are from our partners who compensate us. This may influence which products we write about and the product we choose in our ‘promotion’. However it doesn’t influence our reviews. Our opinions are our own.
Shawbrook Bank personal loans: At a glance
You could borrow up to £35,000 from Shawbrook Bank to put towards a new car, a wedding, home improvements, or debt consolidation, for example.
You can apply for a Shawbrook loan and receive a decision online, but it could take several days before the money arrives in your account. To be able to apply for one of these loans, you will need to have a good to excellent credit history and regular income, so it’s unlikely to be suitable if you need to improve your credit score.
Remember, if you’re considering a loan it’s sensible to only borrow what you need and pay it back as quickly as possible based on what you can comfortably afford to repay each month.
Promotion
Shawbrook Bank Personal Loan
-
Representative APR16.6%
-
Representative ExampleRepresentative APR 16.6% (fixed). Based on a loan of £10,000 over 60 months at an interest of 16.6% p.a. (fixed). Monthly repayments of £240.30. Total amount payable £14,418.17. Maximum APR: 29.9%.
-
Available amounts£1,000 to £35,000
-
Available Terms1 to 7 years
-
Joint LoansYes
- Must be aged 21 to 75
- Must have been a permanent resident of the UK for at least 3 years
- Must have an annual income of at least £15,000
- Must have a personal UK bank account
This loan eligibility service is powered by Monevo. The data you supply is directly submitted to Monevo and is used to retrieve loan quotes from Monevo’s panel of lenders. By using their loans eligibility service you are agreeing to Monevo’s terms and conditions and privacy policy which can be found at Monevo.co.uk. Neither Monevo or Nerdwallet Ltd carry out credit repair services. Late repayment can cause you serious money problems.
Shawbrook Bank loans pros & cons
Pros
- You can change your monthly loan payment date.
- You can get an immediate decision and your loan agreement can be signed online, speeding up the process.
- You can apply for a joint loan. Restrictions may apply.
- You can manage your loan via its online portal.
Cons
- You can face interest charges if you want to settle your loan early.
- It can take up to three working days to receive funds in your account.
- You can only get in touch with Shawbrook Bank’s customer support via phone or email.
The pros and cons featured here are chosen by us based on a combination of our expert opinions from our research of the personal loans market and an exclusive survey of UK consumers conducted on behalf of NerdWallet UK in February 2023 to identify the features of personal loans that people feel are most important. They are unlikely to be the only product features and restrictions that you should consider. Pros and Cons are subjective and you should align them to your own personal circumstances. Information was correct at the time of publication but may have changed since.
Shawbrook Bank loans overview
Shawbrook Bank offers unsecured personal loans, alongside a range of other financial products, such as savings accounts, second charge mortgages and business finance.
Shawbrook Bank offers personal loans ranging from £1,000 to £35,000, which you can repay over one to seven years. You would make the repayments in fixed monthly instalments for the length of the term, with the option of making overpayments or settling your debt early if you choose to.
Like with many lenders, you can check your eligibility for a Shawbrook Bank loan before you formally apply. This means you can see if you are likely to get approved, without worrying about harming your credit score.
While the application and approval process can be relatively fast as everything is done online, you could have to wait a few days before the loan is in your account and ready to spend.
You could also consider using a loans eligibility service to conduct a soft search across multiple lenders and provide you with results of your likelihood of a successful application against several different loans, without affecting your credit score. But do check the details of the service you use, to make sure it only uses soft searches and how many lenders it checks.
| Amount borrowable | £1,000 to £35,000 |
| Term length | One to seven years |
| Time to receive funds | Within three working days |
| Need to have an account with the provider | No |
| Customer support | Phone, email |
| Trustpilot rating | 4.6 stars (29 March 2023) |
Where Shawbrook Bank personal loans stand out
You can make overpayments without paying a penalty: This can help you to clear your debt faster and reduce the amount of interest you pay in total.
It offers joint loans: Shawbrook Bank allows you to apply for a loan jointly with another individual. This could be useful if you want to apply for a loan with your partner, to pay for a car, a wedding, or holiday, for example.
You could borrow up to £35,000: Loans of between £1,000 and £35,000 are available from Shawbrook Bank. Other lenders may not allow you to borrow as much as this, so Shawbrook could be a useful option if you need a larger sum of money.
Where Shawbrook Bank personal loans fall short
It can take up to three working days to get your loan: Once Shawbrook Bank has your signed loan agreement, it may take up to three working days before you receive the money in your account. This is longer than some lenders, which can transfer the money on the same or next working day.
Limited customer support: Unlike some lenders, you can only get in touch with Shawbrook Bank’s customer support via phone or email, and it isn’t accessible 24/7. There isn’t a live chat option or a mobile app that you can use to manage your loan or ask for help.
No loan calculator on Shawbrook’s site: Unlike many lenders, Shawbrook doesn’t offer a loan calculator on its website. These calculators allow you to see how much your repayments might be, based on how much you borrow, and for how long you borrow it. Shawbrook says because calculators use the representative APR, or annual percentage rate, for their calculations, their usefulness is limited as you could be offered a different rate than this.
What type of loans does Shawbrook Bank offer?
Unsecured loans
Shawbrook Bank offers unsecured personal loans ranging from £1,000 to £35,000, which is more than some lenders offer. However, there are providers that can offer even larger loans than this if you need to borrow more.
These loans are unsecured so you don’t need to offer any security, such as your car or house, to the lender.
The interest rate on a Shawbrook loan is fixed, which means your monthly repayments will stay the same for the length of the term.
You can repay a loan from Shawbrook Bank over a term ranging between one and seven years. This is standard for most unsecured personal loans.
Joint loans
Shawbrook Bank offers joint loans, which means you could apply to borrow money with your partner, a family member or friend. If, for example, one of you has a less than sparkling credit score, applying together could help you get approved because Shawbrook will consider the credit history and finances of both applicants.
But, if you take out a joint loan with someone, your credit files will be linked. You would both be jointly responsible for paying back the loan, and any missed payments will affect both of your credit scores.
Loans for bad credit
Shawbrook Bank is unlikely to offer you a loan if you have a poor or bad credit history. As part of its eligibility requirements, the lender says you need to have a good credit score to get a loan.
If you have bad credit and want to apply for a loan, there are specialist lenders that may be able to help.
Don’t apply for loans you are unlikely to get because unsuccessful applications will have a negative effect on your credit score.
Am I eligible for a Shawbrook Bank loan?
To qualify for a personal loan from Shawbrook Bank, you will need to meet the basic criteria before it will consider your application. You will need to:
- be aged between 21 and 75 years old
- have been a UK resident for at least three years
- earn at least £15,000 a year
- have personal UK bank account
- have a good credit history with no outstanding county court judgments (CCJ)
As part of the application process, you can also opt in to open banking and allow Shawbrook to view more information about your finances and work out whether you can afford to repay a loan. Sometimes this makes the application process quicker and easier.
Shawbrook Bank loan features review
Loans from Shawbrook Bank have many of the same features you would expect from a personal loan. We explain more about them below.
Making payments
Your loan agreement will set out your repayment schedule, including when your first payment is due. You’ll repay the loan in fixed monthly instalments until the debt is paid off.
If you want to change the date that the payments come out of your account during the loan term, you can do so by contacting Shawbrook Bank or via your online portal. This allows you to pick a more convenient date if your circumstances change and the original date doesn’t work for you.
Overpayments
Shawbrook Bank allows you to make overpayments on your loan, without paying any penalty fees. Most lenders will allow borrowers to make extra repayments, which isn’t surprising as 44% of respondents to our survey considered this an important feature of a loan.
Overpayments can help you to clear your debt faster and reduce the amount of interest you pay in total. There are usually limits in how much you can overpay, so check these in advance.
Paying off a loan early
If you’re in a position to do so, you can pay off a loan from Shawbrook Bank before the end of the term. You will need to contact Shawbrook to get a settlement figure, which you will need to pay within 30 days if you want to clear your debt.
Shawbrook Bank may charge up to 58 days’ worth of interest on your outstanding balance in your settlement figure, or up to 28 days if there is less than 12 months left on your loan term. Even with these charges, paying off your loan early is likely to save you money in the long run.
» MORE: Paying off a loan early
Additional borrowing
Shawbrook Bank may allow you to apply for further borrowing on top of your existing loan. But you’ll need to make a new loan application and it will depend on your financial circumstances at that time. s Shawbrook will only consider your application if it’s confident that you can afford the extra repayments.
Customer support
Customers can contact Shawbrook Bank by phone, which was listed as the most important form of customer support by respondents to our survey. Shawbrook Bank also has a contact email address if you prefer to sort any issues out in writing.
You can also contact Shawbrook Bank via its Twitter account, but the team won’t be able to talk about the specifics of your loan agreement. It’s likely you’ll be pointed to its direct messages or a customer service phone number for further assistance.
Shawbrook Bank doesn’t offer a live chat function, unlike some other lenders. It doesn’t have a mobile app either, although you can manage your loan on Shawbrook’s online portal.
Customer ratings
Shawbrook Bank has a 4.6 star rating on Trustpilot, based on over 6,100 reviews. Ratings for Shawbrook Bank were not available on Fairer Finance’s website. Bear in mind that these reviews cover all of Shawbrook’s products, not just its personal loans.
This information is correct as of 29 March 2023.
How can I apply for a Shawbrook Bank loan?
While many lenders offer loan calculators to give people an idea of how much their repayments would be if they borrowed a certain amount over a certain period, Shawbrook Bank doesn’t offer this tool. In our survey, 45% of respondents considered a loan calculator an important feature for a lender to offer, so Shawbrook could be missing a trick by not having one.
Shawbrook says it doesn’t offer a loan calculator because most use a representative APR (which 51% of successful applicants receive) in their calculations, rather than the interest rate you would get. This means your payments could be higher or, in some cases, lower than those shown by the calculator, limiting the usefulness of the tool.
Even though there isn’t a calculator, you can still check your eligibility for a loan from Shawbrook Bank to see how likely you are to be approved. Shawbrook will ask for certain details about you and your finances, and then run a soft credit check to see if it can offer you a loan. This check won’t affect your credit score.
If you decide to formally apply for a loan, Shawbrook will run a hard credit check as part of the application process, which will leave a mark on your credit history.
If Shawbrook accepts your application, it will send the loan agreement electronically for you to sign and return. This means you don’t need to wait for the agreement to arrive in the post, unlike some lenders.
What information do I need?
When you apply for a loan from Shawbrook Bank, you will need to provide some key information, such as your:
- name and address history from the last three years
- income and expenditure
- employment status
- residential status
- bank account details
In some cases, Shawbrook Bank might need extra information to help it make a decision on your application. This is when Shawbrook could use open banking to get a clearer picture of your finances and determine whether you can afford a loan.
It allows Shawbrook to view your banking information (with your permission) quicker and more easily, potentially speeding up the application process. Alternatively, you can manually provide the information it needs.
How long does it take to apply?
When you apply for a loan from Shawbrook Bank, you could get a decision straight away. However, in some cases, Shawbrook could require further information which can delay a decision being made.
If you’re approved for a loan, Shawbrook will send your loan agreement online. Once you have signed and returned this document, Shawbrook will transfer the funds into your account within three working days.
A long wait when compared to some other lenders who are able to send the money on the same day.
Frequently asked questions
Shawbrook Bank is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), as well as the Prudential Regulation Authority.
It’s not necessarily easier to get a loan with Shawbrook Bank than any other lenders. But, if you meet Shawbrook’s requirements and pass its credit and affordability checks, you could have funds in your account within three working days.
Review methodology
At NerdWallet Ltd UK we base our reviews on the results of surveys we conduct to understand what key product features are important to those who use them, and align them to the product we review.
Product details reflect the information that was available at that time but may have changed since. We strive to give you a review on as many products as possible but it is likely there are others available that we have not reviewed. The review is our opinion, but it does not constitute advice, recommendation or suitability of your financial circumstances.
You can view our review methodology here.
About the Author
