By John Baron
Halifax has announced it will close 15 branches across the UK – including its branch in Pudsey.
The branch will shut on 6 November 2023 and customers are being urged to use Bramley and Horsforth branches instead.
The move is part of 44 branch closures announced by Lloyds Banking Group, which includes Lloyds, Halifax and Bank of Scotland.
A Halifax spokesperson said: “The world is becoming more digital than ever before and more of our customers are doing their everyday banking online.
“With more customers choosing to use digital ways to bank and manage their money, visits at this branch have fallen. As a result, we’ve made the difficult decision to close it.”
Figures released by Halifax show 228 customers regularly use the Pudsey branch in 12 months to March 2023.
They say the number of transactions at the Pudsey branch, which is based in Market Place, have declined by 51% over five years, and that almost three quarters of customers have used either online banking, telephone banking or other Halifax branches, with a quarter using the Post Office.
The news has been met with disappointment on social media.
“Maybe if they opened decent hours people would use it more,” said one commenter.
Another added: “As an employee of the group, even I’m disgusted. What about the elderly who use it like my parents, they don’t drive and aren’t online.”
“Looked at the way customers use it? It’s opening times are now so limited that nobody who works can use it… we’ve complained before. It feels the hours were reduced to limit footfall in order to justify closure,” added another.
Another led calls for an alternative: “Most banking transactions are done online, cash is slowly coming to be a thing of the past so banks will all eventually disappear. A banking hub seems to be the future either run by the Post Office or by the banks joining forces and offering it as a service, but also high street banking is mostly a free service until you go overdrawn etc so we can’t really complain.”
Councillor Simon Seary said on Facebook: “We are disappointed to learn of the proposed closure of the Halifax Branch in Pudsey town centre and our initial thoughts are with all the staff and hope that they find alternative work as quickly as possible.
“The closure is planned to take place on the 6th November 2023 and unfortunately as it’s a business decision we are limited to what we can do as councillor to influence their decision.”
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What they did to this branch was an outright disgrace. They stopped opening on a weekend and cut its weekday opening hours so short that nobody could visit it. So of course footfall was low.
All banks are doing same a deliberate ploy to say no one using it. They open when people have gone to work and shut at 3pm before they finish and then they have the cheek to say no ome comes in
We are all falling into the hands of the government. It was said years ago cash would be a thing of the past so this can indicate a carbon footprint on anyone. But if they took their head out of there arse and realise not everyone is mobile, not everyone has a “smart phone” and people may need to get to the bank to gain cash to get a bus. It’s all down right wrong.