Ulster Bank says plans to cut hundreds of jobs nationwide, when it closes dozens of bank branches, are not new.
Job losses announced yesterday at banking and technology giants Ulster Bank and Hewlett Packard left some 2,000 people without roles - though they may not know it yet.
Ulster Bank parent company, RBS, said it will close between 30 and 40 branches in the Republic and Northern Ireland by the end of next year.
Meanwhile, Hewlett Packard confirmed 280 jobs in Dublin are to go, with the loss of a major contract. In recent years, Hewlett Packard has gone away from manufacturing, and towards outsourced IT support and customer support instead. The company points out that its expansion plan for operations in Galway remains unaffected by this latest announced. The company employs 4,000 people nationwide.
Newstalk's Business Editor Ian Guider told Breakfast the Ulster Bank move is symptomatic of industry problems, but also specific to that institution itself, which has had a bad couple of years:
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Newstalk's Business Editor warns there will be fewer people in retail banking in Ireland next year, and very few likely to be hired into traditional roles, going forward since Bank of Ireland, PTSB and AIB will not hire for retail banking in the future.
Ulster Bank statement
An Ulster Bank spokesperson told Newstalk the job losses aren't new, "Ulster Bank has already announced and is implementing a programme to reduce 'full time' headcount by 950 across the business. Today's investor relations presentation made reference to a smaller organisation with approx. 4-4.5k FTEs (full time staff). We believe that, taking account the 950 reductions announced in early 2012, the remaining decrease in headcount should be met through natural attrition over the remaining course of the strategic plan. We continue to keep our costs under review.
The locations of the affected branches have not been confirmed.
We keep our branch footprint under constant review to ensure we are operating in the correct locations for our customers. We have already announced and implemented a number of branch closures earlier this year including, 22 branches & sub-offices across Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. It is our intention to further streamline the traditional branch network whilst increasing the overall physical points of presence across the Island of Ireland, however the detail of this is yet to be worked through. As we progress this, we will communicate directly with our staff, customers and industry stakeholders."
