RUTH SUNDERLAND on the Post Office cash withdrawal ban scandal

Sylvia Walton opened her bank account with Barclays in 1944 while World War II was still raging — more than a decade before its current chief executive was even born.

A retired nurse and great-grandmother, the 91-year-old has been a loyal customer for 75 years.

Like so many elderly people living in the countryside, Sylvia’s local post office acts as a lifeline.

Her nearest Barclays branch, in Stowmarket, is five miles from her home in Elmswell, Suffolk, so she withdraws her pension — which is paid into her current account — over the counter at the post office round the corner, just two minutes away.

Though not for much longer.

For in a move that even the most greedy and heartless of bankers would find cruel, Barclays’ executives have nevertheless made the decision to axe cash withdrawals from post offices.

Greed

The firm’s new policy has caused immense distress to its vulnerable customers, but it is determined on steam-rollering ahead with the penny-pinching move — even though in the context of its enormous profits, the savings it will make at the expense of Sylvia and others like her look paltry.

For those of us who have watched with dread how High Street banks have slowly abandoned the elderly and those in remote rural locations, Barclays’ latest move, for all its heartlessness, hardly came as a surprise [File photo]

Barclays is expected to shave around £7 million a year off its costs as a result of the move; a negligible sum for a bank which analysts estimate raked in £17 million a day in profits over the summer.

If that is not sheer greed, it is hard to know what is.

And Sylvia is actually one of the lucky ones. She can still drive — though she does worry about how she will take out her cash when the day comes when she can’t.

Mick Mahon, 71, a retired fisherman from Grimsby, is already in that position.

He suffers from osteo-arthritis and finds it difficult to walk further than to the top of his street — let alone the two miles to his nearest bank branch.

He lives only a few yards from his local post office and dreads the day when he can no longer go there to take out his cash.

But in the eyes of Barclays’ cold-hearted executives, heart-wrenching stories like these mean nothing.

Indeed, they’ve hardly bothered to play down the devastating impact of their new ban that comes into force in January, merely claiming that customers will still be able to request cashback from local businesses such as cafes and corner shops.

But this isn’t what people like Sylvia want. And their views deserve to be heard.

For these are loyal customers who opened their accounts years before the invention of the cash machine. They even had savings and current accounts before credit cards were invented.

For those of us who have watched with dread how High Street banks have slowly abandoned the elderly and those in remote rural locations, Barclays’ latest move, for all its heartlessness, hardly came as a surprise [File photo]

More importantly for Barclays, they have stuck with the bank despite its somewhat chequered past.

When it came under fire in the 1980s from anti-racist campaigners over its continued operations in apartheid-ridden South Africa, they remained loyal.

When Barclays was implicated in the Libor scandal — in which its traders were found guilty of rigging interest rates — they did not defect.

And year after year, when its bosses have shamelessly continued to pay themselves eye-watering bonuses, Barclays’ loyal customers have refused to jump ship.

Yet in return, they are being treated with breathtaking disregard — and all to save a relatively meagre amount.

But not only does Barclays’ move seem incredibly callous. It also stinks of hypocrisy.

For while the bank bends over backwards to seem non-discriminatory and pander to millennials — it recently used an LGBT ‘Pride’ flag to illustrate its smartphone app — this policy has a strong whiff of ageism about it.

Of course, many elderly people are perfectly comfortable using new technology and online banking. But there can be no doubt that those affected by this diktat are disproportionately elderly.

And as a result, the bank is squandering the loyalty of some of its longest-standing customers.

For those of us who have watched with dread how High Street banks have slowly abandoned the elderly and those in remote rural locations, Barclays’ latest move, for all its heartlessness, hardly came as a surprise.

In fact, it is symptomatic of a wider trend in banking that impinges on us all.

As well as being enfeebled by the financial crisis, the big High Street players have also been forced to shell out billions of pounds in fines and compensation for their misdeeds, ranging from enabling money-laundering for drugs kingpins to the PPI scandal.

And in recent years a new threat has emerged in the form of glossy new internet-only operators.

Jeopardy

Concerned by the rise of challenger banks such as Monzo and Revolut, Barclays and its traditional competitors are intent on shifting customers away from ‘old-fashioned’ branches, cheques and even cash.

For urban, tech-savvy customers, this is great. But for those like Sylvia, it is an act of blatant betrayal.

For while the bank bends over backwards to seem non-discriminatory and pander to millennials — it recently used an LGBT ‘Pride’ flag to illustrate its smartphone app — this policy has a strong whiff of ageism about it

In the past five years alone, Barclays has shut more than 480 branches — around a third of its network. For the bank then to prevent people using the post office to gain access to their cash simply adds insult to injury.

Nor is it just loyal customers who will bear the brunt of Barclays’ ill-considered move.

It will also have calamitous consequences for post offices themselves, whose role at the heart of local communities is already in jeopardy.

Banking services are a vital source of income for post-masters, the independent business people who run local post offices.

Many are already struggling financially and this could be the last straw for some who are already on the edge. And yet, Barclays has shown no sign of contrition.

The bank’s reputation is already deeply tarnished. Just this month, its former bosses appeared in court, accused of alleged fraud after Barclays attracted billions of pounds from Qatari investors.

Contempt

Meanwhile, for all its grovelling apologies after the Libor scandal, nobody has forgotten Barclays’ notorious culture of contempt for ordinary staff, customers and regulators during those dark years when it was found guilty of misdemeanour after misdemeanour.

It was driven by a bonus-hungry cabal of ‘casino’ investment bankers, who put their own interests ahead of anyone, or anything, else.

Now, this dreadful decision risks plunging Barclays’ name still deeper into the mire.

But it is not too late to turn back.

Despite its past misdeeds, I do not for one moment think that the bank wants to be deliberately cruel to its own customers.

But I do believe the bank will never regain the trust it will lose if it turns its back on them now.

Jes Staley, Barclays’ chief executive, should do the honourable thing and personally intervene to reverse the decision.

There is no shame in admitting a mistake. In fact, it would reflect well on the bank if it truly listened to people like Sylvia.

Forcing through a cash ban at post offices might save a small sum of money. But you can’t put a price on customer loyalty.