By Samantha Jones-
HSBC is shutting 114 bank branches next year, the firm confirmed today.The bank said the closures are due to fewer people using physical branches to do their banking.
The closures, which the bank attributed to a shift in customer preference for online banking, echo similar cost-cutting moves by rivals such as Lloyds.
HSBC said over 97 per cent of transactions, personal loan applications and credit card applications now took place digitally.
The decline in online banking has led to declining demand for over-the-counter transactions with HSBC saying that some of those to be shut were dealing with fewer than 250 people per week.
The bank said it was to invest tens of millions of pounds in updating and improving its remaining branch network, which will total 327 once the closures have been completed.
“Over the past five years, use of the bank’s branch network by regular customers has fallen by 65 per cent,” HSBC said in a statement. “The decline in branch use has accelerated so much since the Covid-19 pandemic that some of the branches closing are now serving fewer than 250 customers a week.”
Jackie Uhi, HSBC UK’s managing director of distribution, said: “People are changing the way they bank and footfall in many branches is at an all-time low, with no signs of it returning. Banking remotely is becoming the norm for the vast majority of us.”
The decision comes a day after the bank agreed to sell its Canadian business to Royal Bank of Canada for $10bn. HSBC has come under sustained pressure from its largest shareholder, Chinese insurer Ping An, to improve its performance and cut its persistently high costs.
The number of people visiting an HSBC has fallen by 65% in five years, the firm said.
An HSBC statement said: “The decline in branch use has accelerated so much since the Covid-19 pandemic that some of the branches closing are now serving fewer than 250 customers a week.”
HSBC UK managing director of UK distribution Jackie Uhi said: “People are changing the way they bank and footfall in many branches is at an all-time low, with no signs of it returning.
“The decision to close a branch is never easy or taken lightly, especially if we are the last branch in an area, so we’ve invested heavily in our ‘post closure’ strategy, including providing free tablet devices to selected branch customers who do not already have a device to bank digitally, alongside one-to-one coaching to help them migrate to digital banking.”