Don’t Tolerate Inactive Banks

Hargreaves Lansdown, the UK’s largest investments platform, has today launched a new TV spot for its Active Savings product, as part of its biggest savings campaign to date. The work is Stitchy’s first above-the-line campaign since its appointment by Hargreaves Lansdown.
The film is the latest phase of the multi-million pound integrated ‘Don’t Tolerate Inactive Banks’ campaign, with activity across OOH, print, social and creator channels already live, and VOD launching alongside TV. The push aims to make Active Savings famous as a better way to save, challenging the hold established banks have over people’s money and positioning Hargreaves Lansdown as a credible home for savings as well as investments.
The campaign is based on the insight that many people with significant cash savings – typically £10,000 to £20,000 or more – leave their money with a familiar bank through habit, trust or loyalty, even when they could be getting more from it elsewhere.
Stitchy’s creative idea uses the Active Savings product name to define its opposite: inactive banks. By giving banking complacency a name, ‘Don’t Tolerate Inactive Banks’ reframes established banks as institutions that benefit when customers leave their savings unquestioned, while positioning Hargreaves Lansdown Active Savings as the alternative.
Directed by Ben Green at Bullion, the drily humorous 30-second film takes viewers inside an ‘inactive bank’, populated by yawning staff, unanswered phones and employees finding increasingly inventive ways to pass the time.
Creator Rob Madin, best known for his comedy alter-ego Brett Domino, stars as a banker presenting a poor savings rate as though it were a generous reward for years of loyalty. His misplaced confidence, set against the lethargy of the bank around him, exposes the gap between the reassuring language of banking and what customers may actually be getting in return.
Stitchy also brought in BAFTA-nominated writer, director, actor and comedian David Schneider as comedy craft consultant, helping sharpen the ad’s characterisation, timing and physical comedy. The humour comes at the expense of the banks rather than their customers, creating a comic world in which the entertainment carries the argument: the more inactive the bank appears, the more viewers are invited to question what their loyalty is earning them.
The film reflects Stitchy’s post-social approach to creativity, taking what social has taught brands about earning attention through recognisable behaviour, distinctive characters and moments people actually want to watch, and applying that thinking to TV.
Rather than treating TV and social as separate creative worlds, the campaign is designed to travel between channels. Madin’s creator sensibility is brought into the TV performance, while shorter social films extend the bankers’ time-wasting behaviour into individual comic scenarios. OOH and print distil the idea into pointed challenges to banking loyalty and complacency, while creator activity brings the issue closer to people’s own savings habits.