Barclays is cutting 1200 back office jobs over the next 18 months as part of a restructuring of its retail banking operations in the UK.
Under plans to streamline the back office processing of Barclays and its mortgage-lending division Woolwich, the bank says three sites in Kent, Essex and the West Midlands will close at the end of 2007.
These sites have a combined workforce of 1203, but Barclays says it expects the total number of redundancies to be "significantly" lower than this due to staff turnover and re-deployment. But the bank did not disclose exactly how many jobs would be lost.
Barclays says the workforce at its UK retail banking division will remain at about 32,000.
Under the 18-month restructuring, the bank will also re-brand branches of its mortgage-lending division Woolwich as Barclays.
Furthermore, Woolwich and Barclays branches that are within 300 metres of each other, representing about 10% of the network, will be consolidated into a single site. Staff from consolidated branches will move into the retained and refurbished premises, which will be fitted with additional tills and new counter technology.
By the end of 2007, Woolwich systems and technology will have been migrated onto Barclays' upgraded operating platform.