TSB quits City base as staff insist on working at home

TSB has become the latest major bank to fall victim to the working-from-home culture as it plans to move to a smaller head office in the City of London this summer.

The lender is upping sticks from its base in Gresham Street – which is often half empty – to a smaller site at Bishopsgate, also in the Square Mile.

TSB chief executive Robin Bulloch is understood to be keen on seeing more staff at their desks, especially as those in its branches cannot work from home.

But the banking group is not imposing minimum attendance requirements on staff.

Working from home became unavoidable for many during the pandemic, but its persistence long after there is any necessity has been criticised by some major corporations including Goldman Sachs. Some politicians believe it is holding back the economy.

TSB hopes that the smarter new site will encourage more staff to make the journey into work.

The bank would like to lure people in every day and not just on the Tuesday to Thursday timetable that is favoured by many, the Mail on Sunday understands.

It follows the decision of banking giant HSBC to downsize from its headquarters in Canary Wharf to a new home near the London Stock Exchange. It emerged last week that Lloyds Banking Group, previously spread across four City of London locations, would be consolidating into three and quitting its London Wall offices next year.

Working from home has become entrenched after the exodus from the office during the Covid lockdowns in 2020.

Some business leaders and ministers have argued that a return to nine-to-five working, five days a week from an employer’s premises, is necessary to restore productivity and revitalise city centres.

TSB’s HQ is understood to be just 50 per cent to 60 per cent occupied for much of the time.

Bulloch has made clear to a leading group of more than 100 senior staff that he expects them to be in for at least a couple of days a week. However, there is no plan to make attendance obligatory, after managers observed the huge backlash at larger rival Lloyds when it said all office staff had to be in for at least two days.

Bulloch splits his time between offices in London and Edinburgh.

This contrasts with the approach taken by Mike Regnier, chief executive of rival Santander UK, who recently revealed that he spends much of his time working from home in Yorkshire.

Regnier told a newspaper that he would have turned down the job offered by the Spanish-owned lender if it had refused to let him work from Harrogate.

It comes as TSB faces an uncertain future amid a hostile takeover approach for its Spanish parent company Sabadell by Madrid-based rival BBVA.

BBVA is seen as at best non-committal in what it has said so far about the future of TSB should it win the takeover battle.

Staff at the UK lender are anxious about what the future could hold should BBVA take over.

Some speculate that the banking group could be sold to a private equity buyer or returned to the stock market.

TSB was previously briefly listed in London after being spun off by Lloyds Banking Group. It was then bought by Sabadell in 2015.

A TSB spokesman said: ‘We’ve made changes to some of our offices to provide more modern collaborative workplaces for colleagues that align to our ways of working model.

‘This includes Birmingham, Barnwood, Swansea and our upcoming move to Bishopsgate, London.’