Santander to Reduce Branch Opening Hours

From July, all but four Santander branch locations will shut at 3 pm on weekdays rather than 4:30 pm, a change driven by shifting consumer habits, the bank said.

The bank operates 450 branches in the UK, after shutting 111 in 2021. All 450 of those branches will remain open every weekday, with “consistent opening hours” of 9:30 am - 3 pm, Santander said.

Then, between 3 pm and 5 pm, branch colleagues will be available for pre-booked face-to-face appointments if customers need support that can’t be provided through alternative channels or earlier in the day.

On Saturdays, 316 branches will shift from full-day (9:30 am–4 pm hours) to half-day opening (9:30 am-4 pm hours). Between 12:30 pm and 4 pm, staff will serve select customers through pre-booked appointments.

76 branches will retain their current half-day Saturday hours while the 58 branches that shut on Saturdays will continue to do so.

The new schedules will take effect on 18 July. Four Santander locations—three locations in shopping centres and the Work Café in Leeds—will retain their longer weekday opening hours.

The Spanish-owned bank said it was altering opening hours after seeing footfall at its branches drop by 33% over the two years preceding the pandemic, and then a further 50% in 2020 and 12% in 2021. Digital transactions increased by around 20% in each of those years.

There will be no compulsory redundancies or reduction of employee working hours as a result of the new schedules, a spokesperson said. Instead, branch staff will be trained to help customers over the phone in addition to their face-to-face roles. The bank has consulted with trade unions over the changes and will provide training for staff as they take on these new responsibilities and roles.

Santander said a pandemic pilot scheme seeing branch staff provide telephone support had been successful, with branch teams helping 1.4 million customers over the phone in 2021.

Richard Owen, Head of Branches at Santander added: “These changes will enable us to maintain our existing branch network while providing significant additional capacity to help customers who want to talk to us by phone. 

“We have seen a continuing reduction in branch usage over several years, both before and since the peak of the pandemic, with many customers preferring to transact digitally or contact us by phone. We want to make sure we have the right mix of channels to help our customers however they choose to bank with us.”

Santander will be writing to regular branch customers from 21 April to inform them of the new opening hours and to offer any support they might need as a result of the changes.

Santander’s move to reduce opening hours while maintaining physical locations has drawn both praise and criticism from campaigners. 

Jenny Ross, Money Editor at consumer advocate Which?, said Santander “deserves credit for taking greater account of customer needs than some of its rivals that have slashed their branch networks without putting in place reasonable alternatives.”

Which? previously revealed that nearly half (48%) of the UK’s high-street branch locations have shut since 2015 or are slated to close this year.

The Lloyds Banking Group is gearing up to shut 60 Lloyds, Bank of Scotland, and Halifax locations between June and September, after shuttering 100 in 2021 and 48 in the first half of 2022. 

HSBC will close 69 storefronts this year between July and October, after culling 82 branches last year. NatWest will shut 32 NatWest and RBS locations between May and July, and Virgin Money has already closed the doors of 31 branches this year.

Nationwide Building Society has taken a similar tact to Santander, promising not to close the last branch in any town before January 2023 but permanently shutting 50 branches on one day of the week.

Although Ross praised Santander for keeping branches open, the schedule change “continues a concerning overall trend of banks chipping away at face-to-face services and opening hours,” she said. She urged the government to use next month’s Queen’s Speech to announce long-promised legislation to protect access to cash.

Santander said it remains committed to the access to cash movement, with representatives on several industry working groups. It’s also participated in the Cash Action Groups shared banking hub initiative, which has opened locations where representatives of major banks serve customers on different days of the week.

Sources