Bank's last Arun branch to close leaving residents to travel to Worthing or Chichester for services

​Customers of NatWest will be losing the firm’s last branch in the Arun district on July 25, with the next nearest permanent branches left in Worthing and Chichester.

MP for Worthing West, which includes Rustington, Sir Peter Bottomley said he has asked for an urgent meeting to discuss the issue, to which he will be inviting concerned constituents.

He added: “I have asked them to check their statistics, they put out something saying they had 200 odd customers in some period, but they only had five personal customers in a week.

“My view is it will leave too big a gap in the village, Rustington is a fair-sized place and there is no banking hub nearby.

"Many of the people are not online, they are used to being able to talk to somebody about financial issues.

“I will ask Natwest if they will delay or cancel this proposed closure until there is a banking hub or sufficient arrangements for customers to manage.

“I say to them don’t walk away when people clearly benefit from having a bank branch in the village.”

A NatWest spokesperson said: “Our customers are using digital banking more than ever before – over 80% of our active current account holders now use our digital services and over 97% of retail accounts with us are now opened online.

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“Our customers appreciate the speed and convenience of digital banking for everyday transactions, and often, when it comes to making bigger, more complex decisions they value speaking to our skilled and experienced colleagues.

“Like any business, we strive to meet our customers’ changing needs and expectations and we’ve been responding to the industry wide shift towards digital services by investing to broaden what customers can do themselves and to offer them greater personalisation.

“While we are increasingly engaging our customers digitally, our branch network remains important to us.

“We are also significantly investing in refreshing our network – we are investing c£35m in our network across the UK, from 2023-24, as well as continuing to invest in shared solutions like the Post Office and banking hubs.”