Lloyds Banking Group is expected to announce plans this week to create 8,000 jobs as part of a £3 billion transformation and technology investment program.
According to Sky News, Britain’s biggest High Street lender is also cutting around 6,000 existing jobs in a broad range of areas, including its group transformation division, corporate banking, retail and community banking activities.
The 8,000 new jobs are rumored to focus on areas of an expansion as part of a three-year strategy revealed earlier this year that aims to digitize the financial institution’s infrastructure and the services it offers across its banking, insurance and pensions operations.
The employees in roles being cut will reportedly have the opportunity to apply for one of the new job openings.
Lloyds, which has more than 14 million customers, has also focused on moving into other financial areas. It recently partnered with Schroders, the asset management giant, to expand the bank’s areas of wealth advice, and in 2016 it purchased credit card firm MBNA for $2.35 billion from Bank of America.
And last year Lloyds became the first financial services firm in the U.K. to bring in Microsoft to strengthen consumer banking security, allowing customers to use fingerprint and facial recognition technology to access their bank accounts. That means passwords and PINS were replaced in a test pilot with features of Microsoft’s “Hello” service, which will “know” users as they log on.
“Windows Hello enables users to log in to a Windows device in less than two seconds, and this use of advanced biometric technology will provide Lloyds Banking Group customers with a more seamless and frictionless experience without compromising security,” noted Ryan Asdourian, Windows and devices lead at Microsoft U.K. at the time.
At that same time, Lloyds also revealed plans to shrink branches down into “micro” versions staffed by as few as two people.
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