Our town’s coffin’
76% of customers paying by cash.
Steve Alvury-Dye, who is 68, lives with his wife on a smallholding a few miles outside of Newcastle Emlyn. He backs that up: “If you’re someone with anyone to do with a cash business it’s making life virtually impossible. They say it’s because we’re not using cash any more but, since I have moved to West Wales, it’s a cash society.
“Things for us like buying feed or animals we trade between ourselves. If we want his lamb or whatever it’s done through cash.”
Ceredigion AM Elin Jones agrees: “High street businesses and farming businesses who have been used to, and continue to use, cash and cheques need to take cash to the bank at the end of the day or end of the working week and that’s causing problems for them.
“When you’re a small business in Lampeter, and now need to take your cash down to Carmarthen or Aberystwyth, that can mean you need to employ another person to look after your business while you’re dealing with your banking. It’s another added burden to businesses,” she says.
Also, not everyone wants to use the internet to bank online and even some of those who want to can’t.
In Ceredigion almost half of all properties do not have “decent broadband” by Ofcom standards – raising genuine concerns that even if you wanted to and were able to use online banking you can’t access the internet.
One woman I spoke to was 70 and a Barclays customer. Her remaining option is to go to Cardigan. She goes to her bank to pay off her supermarket credit card every month – something she can’t do at the Post Office counter.
“I’m a bit of a technophobe,” she admits, but adds she enjoys talking to people, meeting the staff in her branch, and not relying on automated services.
Steve is a Barclays and Co-op customer.
“They all say do it online but what if you want cash? Or if you have a problem? I’m partly deaf and having to speak to a call centre means I can’t hear them clearly,” he says.
Stats show bank branch closures dampen small and medium-sized enterprise lending growth by an average of 63% and postcodes that have lost the last bank in town lose almost £1.6 million worth of lending over the course of a year.
They are services can’t be replaced.
The banks are directing people to the post office and, while everyone trusts and likes the staff there, as Steve says: “The staff here at the post office are fantastic but they’re soon going to be inundated – that’s the problem.
“How much work is that pushing onto them?” But he plans to change to the Post Office bank “because they’re here”.
The post office is inside GS News. Barry Rogers runs the shop which is part way along the high street. Packed with games, newspapers, lottery tickets, games and more, it’s bustling on the Monday morning I visit.
When the town’s post office was to close he was approached and took on two kiosks.
They’re staffed by Donna Maher and Jessica Payne and both know almost everyone who comes in and nothing that seems to faze them on the computers they sit behind.
Donna has lived here for 25 years. Over the past few months she has been answering questions, concerns, and handing out leaflets explaining what they can do, what they can’t, and reassuring customers what happens in the post office is confidential.
One big thing is that they can’t access an account. So if you’ve paid money in and it hasn’t appeared they can’t log in and tell you where it is in the chain.
They can pay cheques in but they are then sent off in protected post. “We can say it will take an extra day but sometimes, for whatever reason, they can take longer and we can’t see from here why,” says Donna.
Traders think the number of people visiting the town is declining. Bank closures are just one of the reasons people will give you for this apparent drop-off. Others are parking and, of course, Brexit.
GS News’ hours are also having to reduce as footfall falls.
“The footfall has died a death over the years. That’s partly down to the banks having already closed – HSBC was a big bank for the town – and there’s a real problem with car parking,” Barry says.
If there is somewhere out of town you can park for free people will go to it. The same applies in Newcastle Emlyn with an outof-town store called CKs.
“People can go out of town for their grocery shopping, lottery tickets, or newspapers,” says Barry.
He is one of those who fears the banks going will affect their town.
“There’s been an inevitable decline in footfall in the town and it has declined after the two went but there are still plenty of reasons for people to come into town.
“I think it has been accelerated over the last few years. With the banks closing it’s an amalgamation of things – there have been parking issues and there’s obviously the rise in online shopping but with less footfall there will be less spent in the shops.”
The thing people in towns like Newcastle Emlyn fear most is that when the banks have gone they won’t be back.
As Rhian says: “We’re worried because things are going to change forever – it’s never going to be the same.”
“It was quiet before and it’s noticeably so now. Friday and Saturday used to be bustling – Thursday too because it was market day. Now we might as well be doing half days Rhian Davies, Y Wiber