To think that banks these days are a disgrace and couldn’t care less about their customers?

[LunaNorth]

This is long, sorry.

I needed to visit a bank today, to pick up some cash I ordered yesterday.

I had to drive 12 miles to my nearest city to do this, as every bank in my market town has closed.

The bank in question has a greeter, some tables for people who have appointments, a bunch of self-service machines, and one cashier.

There was a queue at the cashier, of course, and the man in front of me had a lot of complicated business banking to do, and was taking ages. Not his fault - there was only one cashier.

An elderly woman joined the queue behind me. She must have been at least 80, had a stick, and was leaning against a pillar as there was no seat near the cashier counter.

We exchanged pleasantries and I offered to let her go in front of me so she wouldn’t have to wait much longer. But the wait was still getting too much for her, so I walked the length of the bank to get her a chair to sit on, as she was looking quite tired.

Meanwhile, a woman who clearly had severe mental health issues had joined the queue. When she first arrived, she was managing to keep herself calm, but as the wait went on, she was getting more and more agitated, until a member of staff had to come along and try to calm her down.

When the elderly lady finally reached the counter, I heard her saying to the cashier that her local branch had closed down and she’d had to come all the way into town. The lady replied that the bank visited her area for two hours once a week, but she wouldn’t be able to pay cheques in or withdraw cash.

What good is that then?

It struck me as I was standing there that modern life is utterly shit for the most vulnerable. Some octogenarians might be able to negotiate banking apps, but very many won’t. The woman with mental health issues should have been in some form of supported housing, getting help with life admin - instead, she was in a stressful situation, and being treated like a nuisance as a result.

And how hard is it to provide two cashiers and a fucking chair?

Sorry for the rant. I ended up feeling quite sad standing there today.

TLDR - Barclays Bank - all banks - are bastards. AIBU?

I'm not saying you're wrong but the Internet has changed day-to-day banking out of all recognition.

Those who can't access it are screwed.

We will all be screwed if goes down

You can pay cheques in by post, no screen required. Cash points have been around for about fifty years.

I don't think banks are bastards (for this reason anyway!) they have to justify what they spend money on, and running expensive bank branches for a handful of people, half of whom only use the bank through stubbornness, it's not a good use of money.

It's probably harder for those people to book holidays without travel agent shops, doesn't mean they should stay open (and charge customers more to cover the cost).

I agree OP

the most annoying thing is when I take mum to the remaining bank - don't know how long we'll have it- and the cashier tells her to get me to do it online. Only happened a couple of times.

there are so many people who can't do online banking for any number of reasons and I think it's really unfair to them.

many people will find they can do it now but not when they are old, for a range of reasons. It's very unfair. It should be challenged for equality reasons.

It’s inhumane.

Another thing - everything is so anonymised. Those moments of soft contact in shops, banks, etc are sometimes the only interaction a lonely old person will get in a day, and it’s all being taken away and replaced by self-service.

It makes me sad.

It does worry me if systems go down whether it’s hacking or just a good old fashioned power cut. In my town of around 37,000 people we have five banks and building societies still open, three others have shut since 2020. So I feel quite lucky.

I am fine with online stuff and can do some minor programming though they are not exactly current languages as were used in the 1990’s. So I’m writing I’m not young but not intimidated by tech. But I do not like the rise of everything online, it’s a bit dystopian and though MN is full of the shy, introverts, and the anti social who are all very different personality wise but welcome online interactions most people do like some level of sociability.

I can't imagine going to a bank to do anything but the last time I did which was about two years ago it was jam packed full so from that I take that lots of people do go into a branch. I will add it was jam packed and there weren't enough staff. Wait times were really long. I think people who can't or won't use online banking for whatever reason are really being marginalised. Same thing with people who only use cash.

The problem is when there are any online issues your stuck .help lines end up advising go into branch but they are all shut.
Recently had to rush to x2 branches in different towns cos neither opened consecutive days to sort out transferring money to purchase house. While this was being sorted It really brought it home to me how many older people visited in person, and how valuable this service is .Most people had an issue so it wasn't just taking cash out .
Not a single bank remains in my home town we had 4 when I was young.
I know times change etc but I do feel we are losing something

They're not really there to care. They're there to make money, just like every other business (no longer) on the High St. Of course if they don't get the footfall to stay open, they'll close.

@LunaNorth we used to have a Barclays in my local town. In lockdown the que was 12 people deep. It closed, so the nearest actual branch is a 30 mile round trip. We have a banking hub one day a week but you can't get cash out etc. the journey is not good if you are disabled or elderly. Agree with you 100 per cent. Online banking is fine but i miss going to my local branch

Just registered a POA for my dad, we went into the branch (8 miles away as that’s our nearest now) and the staff member struggled to do it on their system. We could have done it ourselves apparently but if the staff are struggling what chance have we got? We were there 2.5 hours…I asked to use the toilet and there wasn’t one. Had to go to McDonald’s for that. If we’d taken my dad it would have been a nightmare. We said wouldn’t it be good if there was one place that the banks shared so people could go in and do their banking.

I know that. Doesn’t mean it’s right though.

The last time I went into our local bank before it closed I was paying in money for a charity. (The machines only took notes not coins.) The elderly gentleman in front of me had gone in because he was worried a bank phone call was a scam. Turned out he was right and they whisked him into a private room. He hadn't fallen for it, choosing instead to go to the bank to verify he had to make a transfer, but where will he go now?

A PP said the bank kept saying get your daughter to do it online for you. Where is the privacy? This is also a serious issue with everything NHS going online.

It's not wrong either, people would be quick enough to critisise bank running loss making models.

I think the pace of change is about right to be honest. Online banking has been around since the early 2000s so everyone has had plenty of time to get to grips with it. It's not reasonable to expect to be able to have the same level of access to physical banking stuff as we had decades ago considering most stuff can be done online and we can ping money around electronically.

@ViciousCurrentBun

It does worry me if systems go down whether it’s hacking or just a good old fashioned power cut.

You wouldn't be able to do anything IN a bank if their systems were down or there was a power cut either!

Even if you have a wad of cash under the bed, shops etc will be closed, so you'd be very limited as to how you could spend it. We lost all power for 2/3 days during Storm Desmond - our entire city and surrounding towns. Nothing at all was open, trains weren't stopping at the station, buses weren't running, etc. Petrol stations closed, shops closed. Having a bit of cash really didn't help!

It's not the banking systems that are the problem, it's the power grid that buggers up literally everything if it goes down.

So sad, worked in a bank last century. They had good jobs then and brought footfall to the town centre shops. Managers had a lot of discretion and could use common sense, now it’s computer says no and do it on line. My 91 year old mother was told to open an isa on line lol

i left London last year and can confirm that the banks that closed both there and in my new area had high footfall. The banks clearly want this cheaper business model.

i think banks are essential services and should be subject to some legislation for equality so people who have issues using online banking.

@EwwSprouts your point about privacy is true. Mum and I tend to think of it in terms of it being wrong because she is still capable of dealing with the bank so shouldn't be having it suggested to her that I do it. But you are right, some people will be accompanied to the bank by someone who isn't privy to their finances. I now stand back from the counter while mum talks to them. I'm only there because of her mobility issues.

I do wonder if banks will set up hubs and then charge for in person banking. That seems likely to be their next step.

it is a big problem when something goes wrong online. One of my neighbours, who always banks online, had to go to the next town and they couldn't help him. I'm not sure what happened in the end because the phone line sent him there because they couldn't help.

I use the banking app and that’s fine, but recently, I had to provide a bank statement for a legal matter. I can see my bank statement on the app, but can’t print it. The only way to print it, is from a statement that I can see on an email, but can’t access it, because I need a telephone banking number, which I don’t have because I use the app.

In the end I had to go to a branch and ask them to print a copy for me. Fortunately, there’s one in a nearby town.

I also couldn’t deposit cash via the cashier. That had to be done via the machine.

I agree. I've been using cash machines, debit and credit cards since the early 80s. I started using telephone banking (the forerunner to online banking) in the 90s. Been using online banking for at least 20 years, maybe 25, basically ever since I had internet installed at home. My first "home" computer was a ZX80 in 1980 - over 40 years ago. Most people retiring today would have been using computers (or similar electronic tills/equipment etc) during a large proportion of their working lives. They "could have" been using remote banking (telephone and internet) for the past 30 years. If they've chosen not to embrace it, then, that's on them really.

I have a lot more sympathy for those in their 90s, and maybe 80s who may have more easily "missed out" on the tech revolution, especially if they weren't working in middle age or later. I fully appreciate such people would have been in their 50s when telephone banking came in (and 60s when internet banking came in), so many would have been too old to adapt. (Although lots around that age still did embrace tech, the internet etc.)

I'd also stick my neck out and say lots of people in their 80s and 90s would still have struggled with old fashioned banking as memory starts to go, dementia starts to creep in. My MIL is 83 and is completely incapable of looking after her own money, so even if there was a bank branch outside her house, she'd not have a clue and would still need a lot of support from family, like we have to do anyway.

I'd look at things in a different way and rather than keeping banks open just for a minority of people who really don't "need" them, then have a big push to make it easier for people to help others with online banking and telephone banking - develop new systems to make it easier for family to give instructions, by better "authorisation" systems, etc.

In 2008 (and before) we as taxpayers and economic units had to rush to their aid to support them, at our own personal post-tax cost, as they were too big to fail.

In return, they can't even provide a chair for an 80yo woman.

@Bluevelvetsofa yes I had that when I moved

if the solicitor wants a stamped bank statement you need a branch. I bet they all want that.

You are assuming everyone a) has access to the internet and b) knows how to use it.

I can think of at least 3 people from my own family for whom this is not the case. Either because they’d retired long before the early 2000s or they had jobs that didn’t require computer work (yes, there still are some of those around).

Taxpayers have now made a good profit on that deal.

There will be many elderly who could do it 20 years ago but now can't. And that might be you one day.