Man spends five hours locked in bank branch

A man spent nearly five hours trapped inside a bank branch yesterday after a technology failure locked the door on him.

  1 3 comments

Man spends five hours locked in bank branch

Editorial

This content has been selected, created and edited by the Finextra editorial team based upon its relevance and interest to our community.

The man entered the Metro Bank branch in Uxbridge at around 6.00am to use a cash machine. The bank has a system in place that lets customers enter their cards to gain access to branches out-of-hours.

However, the door locked behind the man, trapping him. Coffee shop employee Sana Khan told UK tabloid The Mirror that when he turned up for work, the customer waved to him and slid his card through a crack in the door.

But the entrance system would not work for Khan, who eventually got through to the bank's customer service department over the phone, which dispatched an engineer who failed to open the door. Finally, at around 10.45am a branch staffer arrived to free the customer.

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Comments: (3)

Keith Appleyard

Keith Appleyard IT Consultant at available for hire

I haven't used one of these lobby access points for a few years (I used to live near a Lloyds & HSBC that had them), but surely there ought to be an emergency exit procedure in the event of fire or a power cut?

Lu Zurawski

Lu Zurawski founder, iKnowMe at Lu Zurawski

Perhaps the battle for customer acquisition and retention in retail banking has entered a new phase?

Something similar happened to a US tourist in a London book shop in October 2014. But Borders managed to turn it into positive publicity, with promotions for "evening lock-ins". Go on, Metro. Lets see how good is your PR!

A Finextra member 

At least there was a bowl of water and a biscuit for sustenance.

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