By JESSE GRAHAM
THE closure of Healesville’s ANZ branch will not be reversed, according to one of the bank’s general managers, who said the branch’s diving visitor numbers sealed its fate.
ANZ’s Australian Branch Network general manager Paul Presland told the Mail that ANZ would not consider turning around last month’s decision to close the branch.
He said the decision came after a detailed analysis of visitors to the branch, which, he said, had dived to around half the average for other branches.
“None of these decisions were taken lightly – it has not been an easy decision,” he said.
“We took a detailed look at the operations (at Healesville) and identified that, over a number of years, (transactions) had fallen away quite dramatically.
“This isn’t a decision that we’re looking to litigate – we’ve obviously made our decision.”
Mr Presland said the bank had been contacting key stakeholders in the branch since the announcement of the closure, and would continue to talk to the community about the decision.
However, an ANZ spokesperson said a representative from the bank’s head office would not be attending a community meeting regarding the closure tonight (Tuesday 10 June).
The meeting was called by the Chamber of Commerce, after notice of the impending closure was sent by the bank to account holders and recent visitors on 20 May.
According to the letter, Healesville’s ANZ bank branch will close its doors forever at 3pm on Friday 11 July, and all existing accounts would be transferred to the Lilydale branch.
Since then, community members have contacted the Mail with sadness, disappointment and outrage at the decision, with businesses and the elderly particularly affected.
Many of these people said they would have to change banks, rather than take the 22 kilometre trip to Lilydale.
Mr Presland said that, while it was “regrettable” that customers might change banks, Healesville is “very well represented in terms of banking solutions”.
“We respect that they can choose to make that decision – we understand and accept that,” he said.
He said that an ANZ ATM would stay in the town, but that it would not be a Smart ATM – which allows for money and cheque deposits – to begin with.
For more information on the community meeting, see next week’s Mail.
