Royal Bank of Scotland to slash 200 UK jobs and shut branches
Royal Bank of Scotland is planning to slash around 200 jobs from its retail unit, in the latest round of cuts to the lender's workforce as part of a wider restructuring of the business.
The planned job losses, which were reported by Reuters, mean that RBS will have axed more than one in 10 positions at its UK branch network in the past two months.
RBS is also planning to cut another 20 branches, the sources said, bringing the number of closures this year up to 52.
The bank, which is still 73 per cent owned by the government following a bailout at the height of the financial crisis, has cut around 1,350 roles out of 12,000 from its retail banking arm since the middle of March and has closed more branches than any other British high street bank in the past two years.
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The latest round of cuts will affect staff in Scotland, Wales or southwest England, according to sources close to the process cited by the newswire report.
“This is nothing short of a year-long cull of local branches across the country,” Rob MacGregor, national officer at the Unite union, was reported as saying.
“RBS seem to be sending a message that properly staffed branch services are only for the privileged.”
Read more: Losses widen more than expected at RBS
“We review our branch network regularly to make sure the services we provide are appropriate for each local community, based on customer usage and other ways to bank in the local area,” said a spokesman for RBS.
At its annual shareholder meeting last week, chief executive Ross McEwan said that the number of people using the bank’s branches had halved since 2010 due to the rise in online banking.