The Tamworth branch of ANZ will be closing its doors for almost two months for a major revamp from this week.
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The Peel Street office will close its doors at 3pm on Friday, July 20.
It’ll re-open on September 12, but not as current customers know it, with the bank moving to a ‘Digital Branch’.
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While this is certain to leave many customers, particularly business customers, in the lurch for almost eight weeks, ANZ NSW/ACT general manager Amanda Heath-Ogden said customers would still be able to bank, at the post office.
“We will temporarily close our Tamworth branch to significantly upgrade it as a digital branch, with WiFi and tablet devices to help people with their digital banking needs,” she said.
“Our customers in Tamworth can use the Bank@Post, 210 metres from the branch location, while the branch is being upgraded. They can also use online and mobile banking.”
Customers have been notified about the closure via letters and emails sent out late last month, although for some locals that warning didn’t come out soon enough.
In the meantime, employees are being relocated to branches around the region, including in the Upper Hunter, although ANZ would not comment about the impact a digital branch would have on staff numbers and work hours, if any.
On the ANZ’s Bluenotes news website, group executive Fred Ohlsson said the “modern branches will offer technology to make banking quicker, easier and more efficient for customers – but will still maintain the critical ‘human touch’ aspect”.
Similar digital branches have already been rolled out in other areas across the state, including Dubbo, which was officially opened on June 21, and offers customers 24-hour access to a business cash machine.
Mr Ohlsson said that while it used to take bankers more than an hour to do a personal loan application, that process could now be done in 10 minutes at a digital branch.
