Swedish bank expands and appoints

SWEDISH bank Handelsbanken has opened a new branch in Wakefield and has announced two new appointments.

More than 80 members of the local business and professional communities attended the champagne launch at the bank’s new offices on Calder Business Park, near Wakefield city centre, along with representatives from first, the Wakefield District Development Agency, managers from Handelsbanken’s other Yorkshire branches and Goran Olsson, a visiting manager from Sweden.

As part of its ongoing expansion plans in the region, Handelsbanken Wakefield has also announced two new appointments to its specialist team.

Alan Hind and Melanie Barraclough join as individual banking managers from Barclays with a combined experience of forty years.

They will provide a range of bespoke financial services including mortgages to a growing portfolio of high net worth individuals.

The new branch has already won custom from five neighbouring businesses on the Calder Business Park in the last few weeks.

Branch manager Steve Passey said: “I think people have been intrigued by a Swedish bank opening on their doorstep. When we explain our genuinely personal approach and our ability to make lending decisions at branch level they realise we offer something different from the more formula-driven high street names. Alan and Melanie’s appointment will help us target the local mortgage market in our own way. By basing our decisions on local conditions and our customers’ personal circumstances rather than a ‘tick box’ system, we can provide lending on the larger and less straightforward deals that traditional high street banks are turning down.”

Handelsbanken is one of the largest banks in the Nordic Region and extended its operations into Britain in the early 1980’s.