Lloyds recently announced 48 more of its branches were to be shut, Santander plans to shut 111, HSBC 82 and Barclays 63
TSB Bank is to close 70 of its branches, which will cut its network to 220 from 475 just over a year ago.
The lender said it was making the closures as it has seen a significant decrease in branch use, with the average number of transactions per branch falling since January and nine in 10 transactions now carried out digitally.
Although it also closed 91 branches last year, TSB said it would still have the seventh-largest network in the UK and that it “remains committed to a UK-wide branch network”.
But the move was called “yet another hammer blow to the UK high street”, by Dr Jackie Mulligan, one of the government-commissioned High Streets Task Force experts.
According to consumer organisation Which? there have been over 4,299 closures of bank and building society branches since January 2015, a rate of around 50 each month.
This follows Lloyds Banking Group PLC (LSE:LLOY) last month announcing 48 of its branches were to be shut; while in September, Virgin Money UK said it was shuttering 31 of its local sites, while Santander UK revealed 111 planned closures in March. HSBC has said it is closing 82 this year, Barclays has revealed 63 closures are planned.
Robin Bulloch, TSB’s chief customer officer, said: “Closing branches is an incredibly difficult decision to take, but we have to respond to the changes in the way people bank and provide the right mix of services for all our customers now and into the future.”
TSB said that the bank had opened “pop-up” services in 41 locations and a further 10 were now planned.
Since 2015, NatWest has closed 1,086 branches, according to Which, with Lloyds shutting 680 and Barclays on track for 650.
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