THE BANK THAT CAN’T COUNT
We find 20 times the customer numbers RBS claimed
Customer numbers at closurethreatened RBS branches are up to 20 times higher than the bank’s official figures.
The Sunday Mail investigated two of the 10 branches which are facing the axe. Low figures were used by RBS executives to justify closures.
Customer numbers at closurethreatened RBS branches are up to 20 times higher than those suggested by official bank figures, a Sunday Mail investigation has found.
Senior executives at the bank said the Melrose branch had an average of 53 customers a week, while Beauly had just 27 per week.
The low figures were used by personal banking chief executive Les Matheson and his board to justify the decision to target the rural branches in their cost-cutting cull.
But when we visited the two – which are included in a list of 10 branches that will remain open until the end of the year – we saw a substantially higher footfall.
In Beauly, 85 customers banked in store in just one day, and in Melrose 151 customers visited.
If those numbers stayed consistent for a week, it would mean Beauly could expect up to 600 customers, while Melrose could see more than 1000.
The numbers are even higher when customers who visited solely to use an ATM are factored in.
Campaigners claim RBS figures are likely to have been manipulated.
And Lib Dem leader Vince Cable – who introduced the UK Government’s last-bankin-town policy in 2015 when he was UK business secretary – called the RBS “grossly dishonest” after seeing our evidence.
His policy meant banks would have to investigate alternative arrangements for customers before closing the only remaining bank in a town, with cash machines, banks on wheels and Post Office branches considered as solutions.
Cable said: “It does sound very manipulative, doesn’t it? It’s as if they’ve made up their minds they were going to shut these branches and they are finding excuses even though your research directly contradicts it.
“It does suggest that they are being grossly dishonest or they are just very, very incompetent.”
He added: “They most certainly should apologise and backtrack. I think they should publicly apologise for getting it so badly wrong and they must reel from the decision to close these branches.
“I have very strong sympathy with the people who are fighting to stop the closures. The savings are trivial. This is a question of being pound foolish, penny wise.
“I established the last- bank-in-town policy, which we were quite tough on when we were in government. I think since the Conservatives took over they’ve just let that go.
“I think it is actually a responsibility of the UK Government to enforce the last-bank-in-town policy and not just let it drift the way they have.”
He added: “RBS are just inf laming public opinion quite unnecessarily.
“It’s anti-social and it just adds to the story which has been revealed in the last few weeks of that history of the treatment of small businesses, that they are still completely insensitive to the public opinion. We have to acknowledge that there is technological change and obviously the pattern is changing – but there are still large numbers of people who are not yet able to operate on the internet.
“There is a lot of internet scam activity with money so it’s perfectly reasonable that lots of people will continue to lose a physical facility and the banks have a responsibility to manage that in an orderly way.”
Kirsteen Currie, a Highland SNP councillor who has campaigned against closures in her own ward and others, said she believed f igures released by RBS represented the number of transactions that could only be carried out in a branch, rather than the total number of visitors.
She said: “It’s highly unlikely that people are taking time off work, or even just time out of their day, to make a point of using the branch if they don’t normally. So the number of people seen last week using the branches is more likely to be the realistic figure of how well-used it is.
“I have been told that if somebody goes into the branch and carries out a transaction that could have been done online it is not counted as somebody being there.
“I can’t get clarification on this from RBS but I’m sure their silence is golden.
“Though they are not lying technically, they are telling the truth about the number of transactions that could only have been done in the bank.
“It’s like the old Tory thing of changing the definition of what unemployment was during the 80s and early 90s so they could manipulate the figures and say unemployment was down. It’s lies, damn lies and statistics.”
Richard Taylor from the Edinburgh
Positive Money group, who campaigns for a fairer banking system, added: “The figures seem pretty shocking if they are representative. It is certainly not the first time RBS’s honesty has been called into question in the last few months.
“These branches are important. Many people, especially those who are older or less confident with technology, really value being able to bank by interacting with a real person.
“Closures have a detrimental impact on local businesses, too. There are more innovative ways RBS could retain a presence on those high streets if they wanted to. It’s just a further indication that our banking system isn’t working for us.
“Banking is a public utility but we fail to regulate it properly. That’s why Positive Money are campaigning for a banking and money system that actually supports a fair and sustainable economy.” The Beauly and Melrose branches are among 10 rural branches which were given a stay of execution until the end of the year, after we revealed their U-turn on closing 62 rural branches in Scotland.
But customers using the branch in Melrose insisted they don’t believe the bank will properly consider keeping their branch open permanently.
Sue Cook, 60, from Melrose said: “This stay of execution could be setting the branch up to fail.”
Fire safety company managing director Alec Bryson, 60, from Galashiels, added: “Even though this is a well-used branch, I think they will point to internet banking and that there is another hole in the wall down the road and just close it anyway. They won’t listen to public opinion.”
In Beauly, locals said they want action from politicians to turn it around. Robert Wilson, 75, a retired NHS workerker from nearby Kirkhill, said: “I’vee been banking here for 60 years. Nowow they are going to shut it down withouthout a thought for their loyal customers.mers.
“Closure of this branch woulduld be a disaster for people from heree and the sur rounding areas l ikeike Strathglass, Kiltarlity, Muir off Ord and my own village.
“It’s been given a stayy of execution so now it’s up to our MPs to stop this. They’d betterter or we won’t be voting for themm again.”
Nicole Collins, 47, runs ns the shop and post office in n Cannich, 17 miles away,, and says internet banking isn’t alwaysys an option.
She said: “If this branch closes, I will have to switch my banking tot InvernessI with a round trip of 60 miles.
“It seems like a busy branch to me so it makes the decision all the more strange. In Cannich, my internet can be on at night and off in the morning so internet banking is not an option.”
Last week, after announcing huge profits, RBS bosses, were urged to use the extra money to save branches.
They announced they were out of the red for the first time in a decade with a profit of £752million for 2017.
It dwarfs the £ 8.7million the Sunday Mail revealed the RBS stood to save by selling off the 62 branches.
Yesterday, a spokeswoman for RBS said: “Royal Bank of Scotland has listened and engaged with customers, communities and elected representatives from all parties and will now keep 10 branches open until the end of 2018 and provide an additional support package for customers across Scotland. Beauly and Melrose are included in these branches.”
It’s as if they’ve decided they were going to shut these branches and are finding excuses