03.10.2022

What happens when all the banks leave town?

Access to services News banking Rural Economies isolation Rural Vulnerability Rural Business access to cash

The BBC reports that it's been a couple of months since the last bank closed its doors in Brechin

Some people have hardly noticed. They moved to internet banking years ago and rarely set foot in one of the five bank branches which once stood in the high street.

For others uncomfortable - or even frightened - of signing up to their bank's app, it's another inconvenience in their day-to-day life as more services move online.

Meanwhile, some businesses say they have seen a drop in footfall as fewer potential customers travel to to the Angus town from its rural hinterland to do their banking.

The answer to Brechin's banking problems may lie 100 miles south in Cambuslang, where the last bank closed in 2017.

Local people travelled to Rutherglen to do their banking - and stayed there to do their shopping. But business owners had to close early to make the trip, find a parking space, and bank their takings.

They claim a new banking hub - one of the first of its kind in the UK - has revitalised the high street, with more people choosing to stay local and more businesses choosing to move into empty units.

It offers a basic banking service - depositing money, withdrawing cash, paying bills - to customers of any bank. There is also a private space where customers can speak to someone from their own bank about more complex issues.

Local hairdressers, bookmakers, and pubs use it to get access to change, and to bank their takings and tips.

Mark Lauterburg, a member of the community council who led the drive for the hub, said: "Businesses were estimating that to do their business banking was taking between an hour and a half to two hours, whereas to do that now, it's four or five minutes."

Its day-to-day service is similar to that offered by the Post Office, without the lines of people queuing to post parcels. Customers say they appreciate being able to able access their money securely in a building which looks like a bank and feels like a bank.

Full article:

The BBC - What happens when all the banks leave town?