Centre would offer basic banking facilities from major UK banks
There are several vacant units in the Oaks Shopping Centre
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Plans for a Banking Hub in Acton look to be making progress again with the possibility that it could be operational early next year.
According to Maire Lowe, a former director of the Acton Arts Project, an outline agreement has been signed for the hub to take a vacant unit in the Oaks Shopping Centre on the High Street.
It is not expected that the centre will open this year as the details of the contract need to be finalised and then the premises need to be fitted out, security equipment installed and staff recruited.
Once open the centre will offer basic banking services to customers of multiple major UK banks. It is run jointly by the Post Office and lenders and will also provide rooms for customers to meet with staff from their own bank for more complex transactions.
Banks including Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, NatWest, Santander, TSB and Danske Bank, as well as the UK’s largest building society Nationwide, have all signed up to the scheme.
We asked for confirmation of the plan from the management of the Oaks but have not yet received a reply.
Acton was due to be the first banking hub in London. It is not known whether the delay will mean it will lose the honour. Acton was chosen after sustained lobbying by Rupa Huq MP who raised the issue of the lack of banking facilities on the High Street with former Chancellor Rishi Sunak.
Other sites were considered for the facility including the former premises of Barclays Bank and the Post Office on The Mount.
Banking hubs are being promoted with the industry-backed Access to Cash Action Group (ACAG) who met with Rupa Huq, MP for Ealing Central and Acton, and Acton councillors last year after which the hub plans were confirmed.
Rupa Huq, said, “I understand a lease is very close to being signed, which is fantastic news for the thousands of Actonians who still use cash daily and the local businesses that need places to withdraw and deposit it.
“After lobbying the government and the banks on what happens when a place becomes a banking desert (as is also the case with West Ealing and in earlier decades afflicted Northfields Ave and Pitshanger Lane), I’m delighted there is movement towards getting banking services back in central Acton. This “hub” will be the first of its kind in London provide which will not only be a boost for the economy locally but it will also help address the loneliness crisis that afflicts many elderly who find visiting a bank part of their daily routine. The Hub has real potential to arrest the decline of the High Street locally.
“I’m already in touch with a Scottish MP, Margaret Ferrier, where a banking hub has been successfully rolled-out in her area. I’m seeking to have further discussions with representatives from the Cambuslang Hub to learn more about how they got engagement and momentum ahead of the opening, and since then.”
According to consumer campaigning group Which?, the rate of bank branch closures increased significantly in 2021, peaking between June and August when 298 branches closed their doors - an average of 99 per month. But the independent Access to Cash Review has found that more than 5 million people in the UK are still “heavily reliant” on notes and coins.
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August 17, 2022
