Fife TSB branch among those earmarked for closure by banking group

The news that the High Street branch is set to close in September comes as TSB confirmed it is closing 36 of its banks around the country and cutting 250 jobs across the business.

The job cuts will be in the fraud operations department of the bank, central operations and staff who work at the branches earmarked for closure.

The Leven branch is one of ten Scottish banks set to shut in the latest round of closures.

The move has been described by union Unite as a “grave mistake”.

Andy Case, Unite’s regional officer, said: “These workers perform essential work in the fraud departments and across the branch network. Through extensive negotiations Unite has been able to substantially reduce the number of jobs at risk.

"However that isn’t sufficient, the union is pressing TSB to urgently reconsider its damaging bank branch closures plan.”

Unite said it will be holding fresh negotiations with TSB about ways to further reduce job losses and to support members affected by the changes.

TSB said it had decided to close the local branches because not enough customers were using them.

About 96 per cent of all the bank’s transactions take place outside of a branch, with the number of in-store transactions falling by 43 per cent over the past four years.

A spokesperson for TSB said: “The decision to close a branch is never taken lightly, but our customers are now doing most of their banking digitally and we need to move to a better balance of digital and face-to-face services.

“We remain committed to a national branch network and through innovation and integration with video, telephone, digital, branch and other face-to-face services TSB customers have more ways to bank with us than ever before.”

TSB will have 175 branches across the UK after the latest round of closures.

The lender said it is opening two more “Pods” in local communities, where customers can speak to an expert and get help with using mobile and online banking, and withdraw and deposit cash.

It will also be opening a pop-up service in six new locations which people can visit for face-to-face support, including making payments, getting product information and help with digital banking.