Leominster to lose central ATM

A Herefordshire town centre will lose a cash machine when a bank closes in three weeks’ time, it has been confirmed.

Barclays Bank has submitted plans on how it will decommission its Leominster branch on the town’s Corn Street, which include removal of the bank’s street-front ATM.

The existing opening will be filled in, while an external CCTV camera and letterbox will also be removed. But otherwise, “the original building fabric will not be altered, removed or concealed”, a statement with the bank’s application says.

“All works are intended to involve the minimum intervention and to be reversible in the future, allowing the building to evolve and maintain the possibility of new uses or layouts within the context,” it adds.

A local petition aimed at stopping the closure, begun earlier this summer, appears to have been unsuccessful.

Having previously been housed in the larger Buttercross building at the top of Broad Street, the bank opened its Corn Street branch in 2018. It is due to close on September 1.

The town’s Halifax Bank branch on West Street is also due to close in November, with the HSBC in Broad Street having shut, and lost its ATM, in April.

There remains a cash machine at the Lloyd’s branch on Corn Square and at the Nationwide in the High Street, as well as at the Coop Food store in Dishley Street.

Comments on the bank’s planning application, numbered 232348, can be made until September 8.