Is Santander taking over my town?

Butterfliesarepretty

Today I went into Bury and noticed there are three santander branches in the centre. Why?
One on The Rock, one in the entrance to shopping centre and one opposite the nationwide?

Seems a bit odd to me to have three branches.

Im with them and have just got a £45 credit for their failed attempts at sending me a new card with my new name on it.

I had been into the branch in april to give them my new deed poll form to copy and filled in a form to change the name on my account back to my maiden name in memory of my dad. Three weeks later my account name had been changed but no sign of a new debit card, went into branch she said it had been sent out.

A week later no sign, phoned them up, they apologised and requested a new card with new name. 5 days later new card arrived but with the old name on.

After my numerous messages online about their rubbish service, they are now sending me another card and credited my account with the £45.

Lith

Santander are everywhere... only about 2 yrs ago.. there was only ONE branch in my town now there is 6 yes you heard me 6! i think its crazy and there willl be more... because there is an RBS branch here.. which will soon be another Santander.

seems they are buying everything and opening branches everywhere.

rdp1980

Similar in Bradford and Oldham. I think there the duplicate branches used to be separate Abbey, Alliance & Leicester, and whatever else Santander bought out. Maybe at some point in the future they will be amalgamated.

scottishblondie

There are 3 branches on Byres Road in Glasgow, all within 100m of each other. 1 was an Abbey, 1 was an Alliance and Leicester, and the other was a Bradford and Bingley. It seems rather redundant to keep them all!!

jen245

There are 4 soon to be 5 (once the RBS is sold off!) on my local high street, all within a few yards of each other, I dont think they'll be able to sustain all those branches

pmduk

Soon after they take over the RBS branches. I suspect there'll be a mass clearout of branches.

stclair

I think its mad how they are wasting there money on doing them up to end up closing them anyway.

In Manchester when RBS on Mosley Street closes there will be 3 within step of each other is there really a need !!

pmduk

stclair wrote: »

I think its mad how they are wasting there money on doing them up to end up closing them anyway.

In Manchester when RBS on Mosley Street closes there will be 3 within step of each other is there really a need !!

They'll close the old B&B branch I reckon, the Market Street branch is in the shopping area, they might wanna use the office space in the RBS building as it's a relatively prestige building.

Cross Street is another bottle-neck of branches.

premierfella

Two ex-Abbey branches in central Croydon (reasonable) became four with the acquisition of the ex-B&B and ex-A&L (foolish waste of money). And of course there is an RBS branch in the centre as well...

If I were a shareholder I would be questioning the strategy of keeping open so many branches. The only reasonable explanations I can think of:
- the terms of the leases nullify savings that would be generated from closing the branches and associated staff redundancy costs;
- Santander gave commitments on keeping B&B and A&L branches open for a minimum period;
- Santander are still assessing which of the branches are most profitable for them to keep in the longer term (although that wouldn't explain the money spent refitting the ex-B&B and ex-A&L branches).

dzug1

I suspect that in the longer term they will be looking to merge them into fewer, larger branches. That does take time

My own local town has an ex Abbey and an ex B&B right opposite each other - but neither is large enough to cope with the combined customer load. I didn't notice much refitting though.

opinions4u

dzug1 wrote: »

I suspect that in the longer term they will be looking to merge them into fewer, larger branches. That does take time

My own local town has an ex Abbey and an ex B&B right opposite each other - but neither is large enough to cope with the combined customer load. I didn't notice much refitting though.

This is exactly right.

Where they have multiple branches in the same location, there will be no desire to keep it that way forever.

But equally there will be no desire to shove all the customers in to one set of existing premises where the capacity in terms of faciltiies just isn't big enough.

Simply closing 3 branches (but keeping the rates and rents because retailers aren't exactly flocking to the high street) and opening a posh new one (massive costs involved) doesn't happen overnight and doesn't happen when capital it tight.

I suspect they'll be carrying out a review taking in to account RBS branch sizes and we'll see a gradual change in representation, starting in the bigger cities and moving outwards to the smaller towns as time passes.