AS billions more pounds of taxpayers’ cash has been spent on Britain’s ailing banks, holders of more than 40 million current accounts might hope the management of their financial affairs is about to be transformed.

Surely, we must get something for all that money. As the Government stumps up another £33.5bn, the bailout bill for Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group soared to £76bn – and the total “bank rescue” bill hit £20,000 for every person in Britain.

In this latest deal, forced through by the European Union, about 1,000 bank branches could change hands, profitable insurance companies such as Churchill and Direct Line must be sold by RBS – and ancient banking names could return, such as Williams and Glyn’s Bank.

Lloyds’ hapless shareholders, who have lost millions since the bank’s disastrous “rescue” of HBOS a year ago, must stump up another £21bn in the biggest rights issue of all time, with no chance of a dividend before 2012.

Meanwhile, out of the wreckage could step Tesco Bank, and maybe a Virgin Money Bank too, if someone finds the cash while Sir Richard Branson’s team adds marketing fizz.

Their first target? Maybe the £2.65bn charges on unauthorised overdrafts that the Office of Fair Trading thinks form too big a part of £8bn profits made on current accounts each year.

Most bank customers, however, will see little immediate benefit from this upheaval, says Annie Shaw at cashquestions.

com She said: “Customers of existing banks, whether under new ownership or not, are unlikely to see any change in the trend towards higher, if more transparent, charges, cautious lending and the gradual ending of free current-account banking.”

Launching any new bank obviously isn’t easy. Insurance giant Standard Life, a big name in personal finance, has thrown in the towel after trying for 11 years of an economic boom to build its own bank.

After losses totalling £45m, it sold to Barclays for £226m.

Kevin Mountford, head of banking at moneysupermarket.

com, says that more competition generally heralds a better deal for consumers, so new entrants to the market would be welcome.

But a moneysupermarket.

com survey reveals that only four per cent of consumers would trust a supermarket brand to look after their finances, and only ten per cent would expect better service from a supermarket than a bank.

Only a quarter said they would take out a credit card with a supermarket brand.

Mountford thinks the best thing to emerge could be a simpler, faster service when switching accounts.

He said: “The way you are shoehorned into an organisation that you don’t like must be changed.

“We need a healthy switching environment, which allows people to move around more freely.”