How RBS shut 70pc of branches in 5 years
RBS has been accused of a ‘betrayal’ of taxpayers as a new analysis shows it has closed two-thirds of its branches in Scotland in the past five years.
By the end of this year, the Edinburgh-based firm will have shut down 200 branches north of the Border since 2013, a Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) report reveals.
It is now calling on the UK Government, which is a major shareholder, to step in to stop dozens of closures planned by the taxpayerbacked company.
Trade union leaders also accused bosses at the firm of a ‘betrayal’ of the people of Scotland, who helped fund a £45billion bail-out which prevented the collapse of RBS at the height of the financial crisis.
Bank bosses are due to be grilled by MPs on the issue when they appear in front of a powerful Westminster committee today.
The FSB’s Scottish policy convener Andy Willox said: ‘Local businesses and the communities they serve need banking services. Cash is still the most frequently used consumer payment method and you can’t deposit cash using an app.
‘Branch closures hit firms with additional costs. It becomes more difficult to manage cash flow and forces them to waste hours that should be spent doing business traipsing miles to a distant branch.’
RBS is planning to shut 62 branches north of the Border, including many which are ‘the last bank in town’ and will leave some customers facing long journeys to do their banking.
The FSB report found that RBS had closed, or intends to close, 211 branches in Scotland between 2013 and 2018, leaving only 89 branches, a reduction of 70 per cent.
In a submission to the Scottish Affairs Committee, which will today hear from Les Matheson, chief executive of personal and business banking at RBS, and its personal banking managing director Jane Howard, the FSB said: ‘It is essential that the UK Government establishes a minimum level of banking service provision.’
Lyn Turner, regional officer at Unite Scotland, said: ‘The taxpayer still owns the bank and yet the payback for its rescue is now the proposed closure of one in three of its branches across Scotland. This is a betrayal of the people of Scotland.’
A Treasury spokesman said: ‘The decision to open and close branches is a commercial decision taken by the management team of each bank. The Government does not intervene in these decisions.’
A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: ‘We urge RBS to listen carefully to the views of local communities and – particularly in cases where towns could be left with no bank at all – to reconsider some of these planned closures.’
An RBS spokesman said: ‘Our business banking teams have been contacting customers who use these branches regularly to advise them of the closure, what it means for them and the alternative ways to bank.
‘Since 2012, the number of customers using our branches in Scotland has fallen by 44 per cent. Only one per cent of our customers in Scotland now use a branch regularly.’
‘You can’t deposit cash using an app’