Barclays Closing High Street Banks

subjecttocontract

Yes I agree it is all a bit strange. But as the saying goes.....out of sight, out of mind .....and that's exactly where Barclays will be once they disappear from my high street. Let's hope they don't come back !

boingy

Back when I was a student in the eighties there was a student mantra of "Don't Bank With Barclays". The mantra has stayed with me but I have absolutely no recollection of why the mantra existed! 

Mind you, I broke the "rule" last year for the switching bonus, tart that I am.... 

Nasqueron

Miles86 said:

Nasqueron said:

DullGreyGuy said:

Section62 said:
If you go down that rabbit hole then are the people using free (and online only) current account banking whilst in credit expecting to be subsidised by current account customers who are in overdraft, or subsidised by the ones paying over the odds for their credit card/loan/mortgage debts?

Picking out one service (e.g. branch banking) from all those provided by banks and arguing that the customers using it should pay for it is a bit of a bogus argument if you don't also think all services should be charged for.

I wouldn't "talk about the elderly". But would say that banks need to get their act together when they still require people to go to a branch for a particular service (as we hear about regularly on this forum) but then shut down all but one branch in a whole county.

No, those with free in credit accounts are providing the funds that are then the basis for giving a loan to someone else. If a bank has no savers and no current accounts it has to borrow (more of) the money to lend to others.

Its basic cost benefit analysis... I make money from savers using free accounts because I use that to provide credit cards at 22% interest or loans at 9.9% interest. 

What value is the having a bank branch delivering? The building, if owned, doesn't count as that value would still exist if it were leased to a coffee shop and that would generate other income. You can argue that it used to be a form of advertising but how many people walk the high street these days? So you have a handful of customers that still want/need to use a branch -v- the millions it costs to staff and run the branch. 


Most the posters on here don't actually say why they need to go into the branch nor why going to a post office wouldn't be suitable. The few that do tend to stick to it being their "right" rather than giving any real need. 

While I agree with your point on the branches, the days of banks using saver's deposits as the basis for loans are long gone, mortgages and loans are done on the national / international money markets. An average UK mortgage of £189503 (to Sept. 2023) would need 11 people with £17,365 (2024 UK average savings) to fund it. There were ~300,000 mortgages taken out April-July 2023 meaning you'd need 3.3m people with the average savings in the bank just to cover those new loans, let alone the next 3 months, the 3 after that etc. Banks use the fractional reserve banking e.g. loans backed by just 10% of the loan amount in reserves - funded by the interbank lending. 

Remember that plenty of those 300,000 mortgages will be, one way or another, repaying other pre-existing mortgages.

It's not true to say that banks *don't* fund mortgages from deposits. Plenty do, but yes some choose other routes too; a mix of deposits and other sources of finance (including borrowing on financial markets yes) fund lending. Fractional reserve banking is what allows that, for instance for every £90 of loans granted you may decide you need £100 of deposits. The 'fraction' is the immediately available £10 which you maybe have with the bank of England, the loans you've granted are still your assets but they're less liquid, think of a Fixed Term deposit. 

It is of course also true that an alternative to raising more funds on the financial markets is to securitise loans, which in the UK generally means selling the loan in the background but continuing to deal with the customer as before. This removes it from your balance sheet. (In the US securitisation usually results in the customers dealing with the company who buys the loans and ceasing to deal with the bank).

If you read my comment - I never said banks don't fund mortgages from deposits, I said, clearly, the days of using the deposits as a basis for loans is long gone - which is true. The artificially high nonsense house price ponzi scheme in this country means mortgages are simply so high and continue raising as everyone decides their house is 5% more valuable that the previous year because it's a year older, means you need an impossible growth in savings deposits to fund this. Thus the amount of savings logically cannot come close to being the entire backing of the mortgages - as I proved - 3.3m people with average savings are required just to back the 300k mortgages for 1 quarter of 1 year, then another 3.3m for the next quarter etc etc - and that is without even touching other loans, personal, car purchases etc etc

Banks need some savings in order to lend yes but the days of the savings being the basis for the loans is long gone

TimeLord1

Thanks everyone for your input, I eventually managed to get the money out of Barclays they just used my mobile to send a pin as I stood there took over an hour and the queue was horrendous lots of people shutting down account's and moving elsewhere. Anyway why I needed it was years ago I was with the Woolwich Building Society taken over by Barclays so I had shares that paid dividends yearly into a share account card-less so only a letter via post yearly, so I could only go into a branch to withdraw this money and basically I don't bother with it until it's worth withdrawing. But they also wanted to close it. I said' it would still be getting the dividends paid into it so they suggested' I sell my shares not worth much but I wonder with all these branch closures is it worth keeping them or selling them off ?

Cheers again interesting reading this. 

WillPS

Can the dividends not be paid elsewhere?

TimeLord1

I believe this is all linked to Equiniti and they only seem to deal with selling shares buying them and paying investors. The fact it's never had a card to support it shows that Barclays don't really want to maintain it or update it, they wanted me to close it down and have since wrote to state the same thing as they obviously see it as a cost to themselves. I get the chance in November to sell up again it costs about £30 to sell them and they'll send me a cheque for the sell price, to be honest they've dropped in value every year. 

wmb194

TimeLord1 said:

I believe this is all linked to Equiniti and they only seem to deal with selling shares buying them and paying investors. The fact it's never had a card to support it shows that Barclays don't really want to maintain it or update it, they wanted me to close it down and have since wrote to state the same thing as they obviously see it as a cost to themselves. I get the chance in November to sell up again it costs about £30 to sell them and they'll send me a cheque for the sell price, to be honest they've dropped in value every year. 

I'm assuming we're talking about shares in Barclays; if you want to you can transfer them in-specie to another stockbroker but I don't see why Equiniti couldn't transfer the dividends to another account, that's what registrars do.

Why do you have to wait until November?

[Deleted User]

boingy said:

Back when I was a student in the eighties there was a student mantra of "Don't Bank With Barclays". The mantra has stayed with me but I have absolutely no recollection of why the mantra existed! 

Mind you, I broke the "rule" last year for the switching bonus, tart that I am.... 

They were previously linked to apartheid South Africa in the 80s

TimeLord1

The full list of 43 bank branches closing and the 11 with no other banks nearby:

• Barclays, Aberystwyth, Wales, 03/05/2024
• Barclays, Gravesend, England, 03/05/2024
• Barclays, Hartlepool, England, 03/05/2024
• BoS, Bowmore, Scotland, 08/05/2024
• Barclays, Dewsbury, England, 09/05/2024
• Barclays, Ayr, Scotland, 10/05/2024
• Barclays, Haverfordwest, Wales, 10/05/2024
• Barclays, Blackburn, England, 10/05/2024
• Barclays, Spalding, England, 10/05/2024
• Barclays, Bangor, Wales, 10/05/2024
• Barclays, Livingston, Scotland, 10/05/2024
• Barclays, Boston, England, 10/05/2024
• Barclays, London, England, 10/05/2024
• Halifax, Dagenham, England, 15/05/2024
• Barclays, Evesham, England, 15/05/2024
• Barclays, Risca, Wales, 17/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• Barclays, Inverness, Scotland, 17/05/2024
• Barclays, Andover, England, 17/05/2024
• Barclays, Bracknell, England, 17/05/2024
• Barclays, Leiston, England, 17/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• Barclays, Bangor, Northern Ireland, 17/05/2024
• Barclays, Wembley, England, 17/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• Barclays, Hornchurch, England, 17/05/2024
• Barclays, Streatham, England, 17/05/2024
• Barclays, Liverpool, England, 17/05/2024
• BoS, Jedburgh, Scotland, 20/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• BoS, Girvan, Scotland, 20/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• BoS, Dunbar, Scotland, 21/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• BoS, Aviemore, Scotland, 21/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• Barclays, Fulham Broadway, England, 23/05/2024
• Barclays, Harleston, England, 24/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• Barclays, Barking, England, 24/05/2024
• Barclays, Oldham, England, 24/05/2024
• Lloyds, Brighouse, England, 28/05/2024
• Lloyds, March, England, 28/05/2024
• Lloyds, Formby, England, 28/05/2024
• Lloyds, Pershore, England, 28/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• BoS, Cupar, Scotland, 29/05/2024
• Lloyds, North Walsham, England, 29/05/2024
• Halifax, Larne, Northern Ireland, 29/05/2024
• BoS, Cumnock, Scotland, 29/05/2024 - No other branches nearby
• BoS, Crieff, Scotland, 29/05/2024 -No other branches nearby
• Barclays, Brentwood, England, 31/05/2024
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• Just seen this list of Bank closures so thought I would add it for anyone to check.