THE curtain came down on nearly 100 years of banking on the corner of Fore Street, Wellington, on Friday afternoon.

The local branch of the HSBC served its last customer at exactly 3pm before bank representative Lydia Jennings closed the two big doors of the branch for the last time to customers.

The closure came as no shock as the WWN revealed exclusively it would close at the end of last November.

Customers were using the branch right up to its closure – but minutes later equipment within the branch was being taken away in an almost military-style operation.

The HSBC closed 222 branches last year and will shut down another 62 this year. It says the ‘branch restructuring programme’ will end this year.

A bank spokesman said: “Fewer people are using branches. More than 90 per cent of our interactions with customers are now through our digital channels – an increase from 80 per cent last year."

For the full story see this week’s Wellington Weekly News.