A public hearing held by the senate in Ingham on May 18 considered if there was a responsibility for banks to keep regional branches open, given the continued profit gained from regional customers, and whether this created a ‘social licence’ for banks.
Despite making $8 billion a year ANZ has closed two thirds of branches over the past 30 years, including the Seymour branch following the October 2022 floods.
Advances in technology and internet banking were identified as key factors in branch closures.
The ANZ representatives, ANZ general manager Michael Wake and director Tony Tapsall, cited that 81 per cent of ANZ customers preferred to use internet banking, with only 19 per cent of customers having used a branch in the past 12 months.
“That’s still a fifth of your customer base,” one senator said.
“It’s a bit rich to say they only come into the branch two times a year [as a reason for closing] when you are charging interest every day of the year.”
The impact of branch closures on communities was highlighted; including for the elderly who may not be technology-literate and those with increased risk for financial coercive control such as women or people with disabilities.
Across all the major banks who were closing regional branches, a lack of consultation with local councils, customers and community groups in the lead-up to the closures was identified.
When questioned on the choice to close regional branches, given the negative impact on the community, Mr Wake said that ANZ had a 24-week closure period, in which time the customer care team could help elderly customers learn to internet bank.
However, this was not the case in Seymour.
He said that the closure of the Seymour branch was only one of two times in his tenure that they had gone outside of the banking code of practice, closing a branch without a notice period.
“Do you think a flood is the right time to go outside of the banking code of practice?” one senator asked.
The senator cited submissions of Seymour ANZ business customers driving for more than an hour to the Craigieburn branch to deposit cash, only to find that Craigieburn was not accepting cash deposits.
“The reason we went out of the banking code of practice was that to refurbish that branch was more than $1 million, we saw that as too large of an expense to do that,” Mr Wake said.
A senator asked how ANZ could be taking the welfare of regional communities seriously if the ANZ Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance report, a 52-page document, did not mention those living in regional and remote areas once.
It was also noted that ANZ refused to pause branch closures for the inquiry, claiming that a pause would be too disruptive to customers and staff.
In November, the closure of 14 branches had been announced and those closures continued, but no new closures were announced, Mr Wake clarified.
ANZ has also sold 1700 of its 2600 ATMs outside of branches to ATM provider ‘ATMX’. Customers can continue to use them fee-free for deposits and withdrawals.
