Looking back to a January 2017 article in The Guardian, and the headline stated "HSBC to close 62 more branches this year, blaming online banking". How can they *blame* internet banking when they have done their level best to encourage us all to do so... and even the tellers in-branch have pushed the point.
This sounds to me like the UK government blaming motorists for air pollution when they have encouraged the take-up not only of cars in general—by centralising services and a light-touch planning system which encourages travel for virtually everything—but in promoting diesels in particular (or should that be "in particulate"?).
Also in the January 2017 Guardian report is this: "The bank said this signalled the end of a closure programme under which 340 branches will have been shut since the start of 2016 following a pledge by the chief executive, Stuart Gulliver, to streamline the bank and cut 25,000 jobs globally" Clearly, the January 2017 pledge meant nothing.
In the same article, António Simões, head of HSBC's UK banking arm, said, "This marks the end of our branch restructuring programme. We now feel we have the right branch network that complements the other ways in which customers now choose to interact with us".
So it is with utter disappointment that we learn from informed sources that "the world's local bank" as branded between 2002 and 2016 will no longer be local here: it's said that Rhuthun/Ruthin's HSBC is to close, in November 2018. No longer can we "come and talk... to the listening bank". When Barclay's announced its decision to close, the rumour at the time was that they wanted to get ahead of the HSBC so that Barclay's wasn't the last bank in town.
Not only will Rhuthun have no clearing bank, it already has no building society agent, either. In 25 years, we've gone from four banks and four building society agents in the early 1990s to absolutely nothing.
The news comes just 20 days after Barclay's and 11 months after the Nat West closed.
So, businesses, especially those relying heavily on cash, now will have nowhere to turn. As for the rest of us, there'll be no "hole in the wall" in the heart of the town. Those at the Co-op, Bridge Services and Tesco are all remote and in any case will encourage expenditure outside the town centre.
Worse than this, it now means one side of St Peter's Square is effectively abandoned, leaving three handsome but empty premises which ring the southern end of the Square.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/24/hsbc-close-branches-online-banking-unions-jobs
Also in the January 2017 Guardian report is this: "The bank said this signalled the end of a closure programme under which 340 branches will have been shut since the start of 2016 following a pledge by the chief executive, Stuart Gulliver, to streamline the bank and cut 25,000 jobs globally" Clearly, the January 2017 pledge meant nothing.
In the same article, António Simões, head of HSBC's UK banking arm, said, "This marks the end of our branch restructuring programme. We now feel we have the right branch network that complements the other ways in which customers now choose to interact with us".
Not only will Rhuthun have no clearing bank, it already has no building society agent, either. In 25 years, we've gone from four banks and four building society agents in the early 1990s to absolutely nothing.
The news comes just 20 days after Barclay's and 11 months after the Nat West closed.
So, businesses, especially those relying heavily on cash, now will have nowhere to turn. As for the rest of us, there'll be no "hole in the wall" in the heart of the town. Those at the Co-op, Bridge Services and Tesco are all remote and in any case will encourage expenditure outside the town centre.
Worse than this, it now means one side of St Peter's Square is effectively abandoned, leaving three handsome but empty premises which ring the southern end of the Square.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/24/hsbc-close-branches-online-banking-unions-jobs