(Bloomberg) -- Banco Santander SA is cutting 1,425 jobs in the UK this year as the banking giant pushes ahead with plans to simplify and automatize processes, Chief Executive Officer Hector Grisi said.
“It could affect additional” jobs, Grisi said in a press conference in Spanish on Tuesday. “It will depend how many people we need for customer relations et cetera.”
The bank posted net income of €3.25 billion ($3.5 billion) in the three months to September. While that was better than analyst estimates, it came with a quarterly drop in interest and fee income, and the UK unit delayed its results while it assesses the impact of an ongoing regulatory probe into motor finance.
The lender started a round of job cuts about two weeks ago focused on the Spanish lender’s UK headquarters, Bloomberg reported Friday.
“We continuously look at our operating model to ensure our teams are organized in the best way to support our customers effectively and efficiently,” a spokesperson for Santander said in a statement to Bloomberg, without directly commenting on the cuts.
Santander’s workforce in the UK was 21,812 at the end of September, down 392 from a year ago, according to its earnings statement.
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