Greater
Bank will temporarily close six branches across Newcastle, Lake Macquarie and
the Hunter and reduce the hours of operation of its remaining branches across
NSW and QLD in response to changing customer behaviour due to the COVID-19
pandemic.
The banks Jesmond, Maitland, Mayfield, Nelson Bay, New Lambton and Warners Bay branches will be temporarily closed from 2pm on Thursday 9 April.
In
addition, from Tuesday 14 April, the operating hours of all other
Greater Bank branches will be reduced to 9am to 2pm Monday to Friday and
not open on Saturdays.
The organisation says these
operational changes are currently in place until 9 May and will be monitored
over that period.
Greater
Bank Chief Executive Officer, Scott Morgan, said the community’s response to
the new COVID-19 lockdown laws has resulted in a significant shift in the way
customers are transacting with the bank.
“Over
the last two weeks our over-the-counter transactions have dropped
significantly, and we have seen an increase in the use of our other banking
channels.
“These
temporary changes will allow us to redeploy our branch employees to support our
customers in these other channels, with four of the branches - Jesmond, Warners
Bay, Nelson Bay and New Lambton - being set up as remote contact centres to
help manage the higher than average call volumes.
“For
those visiting our branches, I can confirm that we are continuing to employ
increased health and safety standards across our network by cleaning branches
and ATMs more frequently, providing hand sanitiser for customers and practising
social distancing and self-isolation.
“Customers
can access cash 24 hours, 7 days a week through our ATM network, and also
conduct a
wide range of banking services through our Internet Banking and Mobile App. Customers can also phone our contact centre on 1300 641 500, however, we ask that they please be patient as we are experiencing longer than usual waiting times due to a large volume of calls being received.”
wide range of banking services through our Internet Banking and Mobile App. Customers can also phone our contact centre on 1300 641 500, however, we ask that they please be patient as we are experiencing longer than usual waiting times due to a large volume of calls being received.”
