TSB fiasco as bank scraps 86 branches
TSB has announced plans to close one in six of its branches in a ‘betrayal’ of customers following two IT meltdowns.
The lender, which was dubbed the Totally Shambolic Bank last year after a huge technology failure, will shut 86 of its 540 outlets by the end of next year. The move puts up to 400 jobs at risk.
TSB plans to encourage more account holders to use online banking. But it is feared that the strategy, coming so soon after TSB’s IT failures, could backfire.
The bank left nearly two million people locked out of their accounts – some for weeks – in April last year when its online systems failed. Another glitch last Friday meant a significant number of its customers did not receive their pay on time.
Former pensions minister Baroness Ros Altman said: ‘It beggars belief that a company which has had such trouble with technology is suggesting more customers should be using online banking. In light of the serious problems this bank has had, the closures seem incredibly insensitive.’
TSB, which has five million customers, has already reduced its network by ten branches so far this year.
Dominic Hook, of the union Unite, called the decision ‘absolutely deplorable’. He said: ‘This is a betrayal of the bank’s customers and staff who have remained loyal through recent tough times. It will have a disastrous impact on many local communities.’
Justin Modray, of Candid Financial Advice, said: ‘Forcing more customers to bank online may well prove an own goal for TSB if it doesn’t nail its IT issues.’
Chief executive Debbie Crosbie was brought in seven months ago to improve the Spanish-owned bank after former boss Paul Pester was ousted.
But on Friday, a ‘processing error’ meant many customers did not receive their pay cheques on time. TSB resolved the issue by lunchtime.
Age Scotland said the closures plan was a ‘slap in the face’ for older customers. The charity’s head of policy Adam Stachura said: ‘It’s extremely disappointing to see yet another bank put profits ahead of its customers, particularly those who need to use a branch most.
‘This will undoubtedly make it harder for tens of thousands of people to access their finances and manage their money on a daily basis.
‘We know older people are more likely to prefer a face-toface service. Seven in ten over65s don’t use online banking, and more than half of Scottish people aged 80 and above never use the internet at all, so they are being left behind with the march to digital banking by default.
‘Bank branches have been disappearing from our high streets at an alarming rate, with almost half closing in the last decade.
‘Banking deserts across Scotland are starting to form, with many towns and villages left with no service at all.’
Mrs Crosbie defended the closures, saying: ‘Branches will remain a very key part of our business. But right now the footprint that we have is unsustainable.’
The bank claims that, even after the closures 65 per cent of its 5 million customers will still live within four miles of a branch.
‘A betrayal of customers’ ‘May well prove an own goal’
IN advertising campaigns of yore, tSB was the bank ‘that liked to say yes’.
today, it still can. But only if the question is: ‘Are you hell-bent on treating customers contemptuously?
Relaunched after the financial crisis with the help of taxpayers’ money, tSB was meant to signal a fairer era in banking – putting customers first.
So it’s deeply dispiriting that the highly profitable lender is now shedding one in six branches. Scandalously, bosses say savers can, instead, bank online.
But tSB recently suffered the biggest It meltdown in banking history, leaving millions unable to access cash and at risk of fraud. Last week, the computers crashed again. this hardly inspires confidence. Indeed, if executives are trying to shake off the totally Shambolic Bank label, they are failing miserably.