NatWest Branches In Southfields and Wandsworth To Close

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As customers "change the way they bank"


NatWest on Wandsworth High Street to close (Image: Google Streetview)

NatWest branches in Southfields and Wandsworth will be closing following last week's announcement from parent company The Royal Bank of Scotland that it will be closing 197 NatWest and 62 RBS branches nationally, due to an increase in demand for internet banking.

Account holders will still be able to use the Putney, Clapham Junction and Fulham Road branches but Barnes, Earls Court, East Sheen, Morden and Wimbledon Village are all set the close.

Further afield in London Acton, Aldwych, Brentford Middlesex, Holborn Circus, New Covent Garden Fruit Market, Shepherds Bush, South Norwood and West Ealing will also be axed.

RBS says it expects the closures to result in approximately 680 redundancies nationwide and made the decision due to an increased demand for online banking resulting in less use of High Street branches, saying, "As customers change the way they bank with us, we must change the way we serve them... closing a branch is a decision we take very seriously."

RBS reports that branch usage is down 40 per cent since 2014 and has recorded 1.1 billion mobile and online transations in the first half of 2017 - an increase of 41% on the same period in 2014. Mobile app sign-ups are up 43 percent in the same period and mobile transation are up 73 percent.

The Wandsworth branch - at 98 Wandsworth High Street - is due to close on May 21st 2018 and the Southfields branch (on Wimbledon Park Road) on June 11th.

NatWest have released guidelines of alternative ways to bank locally here

December 4, 2017