28 March 2007
Employees of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) have been informed that they must take out a current account with the bank or one of its sister firms, or risk not being paid.
This means that all staff at the bank are being forced to open a current account at RBS, NatWest, One Account, Coutts, or Adam & Co, regardless of whether it is the best deal for them or not.
And to add more stress to the situation, recent figures revealed that it can take up to five weeks to complete a current accounts switchover with these banks, meaning that employees who are changing now could lose out on a month's pay.
RBS told FinanceMarkets.co.uk that it is a common industry practice for banks to pay salaries directly into a current account held with the bank the employee works for and insisted that prospective employees are informed about its policy and are free to open other accounts with which ever bank they choose.
However, that appears to have provided little comfort to the large number of RBS employees who have contacted Amicus the Finance Union to complain about the system.
According to FinanceMarkets.co.uk, employees have expressed their wish to take their employer to court over the issue, which they claim affects 14,000 of RBS's 135,000 employees.