(11 May 2005 – UK) British bank Abbey National is set to slash another 1000 back office jobs, which will take the number of job cuts to 4000 since being taken over by Banco Santander Central Hispano.Santander bought Abbey for ₤9 billion in November 2004.
At the time of the takeover, the new management team envisaged making some 3000 job cuts from an overall workforce of 26,000 in the aim of saving ₤300 million over the next three years.
About 1000 workers have already left the bank since the takeover and another 2400 staff have been given redundancy notices.
Santander said the job cuts and closing down of three customer contact centres were part of a cost reduction program at Abbey. The bank said it had saved ₤20 million in the first three months of the year.
Abbey has been struggling in the UK mortgage and insurance markets.