ULSTER BANK HAS become the latest Irish bank to announce branch closures following on from AIB, National Irish Bank and Permanent TSB in the second half of last year.
The closure was confirmed in a statement which said that “in the region of 20 branches and sub offices on the island of Ireland” will be closed in 2013, according to UTV News.
Further details are expected in the coming weeks but the Irish Bank Officials Association said that it learned of the lender’s plans to shut the branches on a conference call with some staff last month.
The bank currently has 146 branches in the Republic of Ireland and 90 in Northern Ireland. It has been reported that ten branches will close in the North and ten in the South.
Ulster Bank was plagued with problems last year when a technical glitch left an estimated about 600,000 customers without full banking services between 19 June and the start of August.
The glitch is estimated to have cost the bank over €100 million between compensation to customers and other expenses incurred during the summer of last year.
Last year a number of banks based in Ireland announced the closure of branches with Allied Irish Banks (AIB) shutting 44 branches across the country in October.
In total, 67 AIB branches will be shut by this year with about €350 million saved, according the state-owned bank.
In July of last year Permanent TSB named 16 branches across the country that it planned to close while in November National Irish Bank (NIB) shut its 27-branch network across the country as part of its rebranding to Danske Bank.
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