ANZ, NAB and ‘Bigger for You’ Bendigo’s ever bigger greed

Despite eye-watering profits, the banking sector is 'throwing workers on the scrap heap while executives pocket bonuses' and providing even less services. Michelle Pini reports.

THIS WEEK, Big Four bank ANZ informed 3,500 employees they were losing their jobs — via automated email.

Not wanting to be left behind, a second banking corporation, NAB, followed suit scarcely 24 hours later, announcing 410 redundancies.

And yesterday (11 September), Bendigo Bank also announced 158 layoffs.

Bendigo Bank … [is] profitable, yet loyal workers are being thrown on the scrap heap while executives pocket bonuses.

~ Finance Sector Union national secretary Julia Angrisano

These latest cuts follow Westpac’s axing of 1,500 staff, Commonwealth Bank’s 164 job cuts and Bank of Queensland’s 200 staff redundancies and offshoring of half its contact centre to India, earlier this year.

According to union figures, Australia’s Big Four banks alone have purged 7,885 jobs in 2025.

In a statement, Finance Sector Union (FSU) president Wendy Streets said the union will be taking this to the Fair Work Commission and described the job losses as 'shameful'.

She added:

 ‘This isn’t one rogue bank, it’s the whole sector driving the same agenda at the expense of workers and communities.’

BIG BOYS ANZ AND NAB

One of the world’s most profitable banks, ANZ, dismissed 3,500 employees by email.

ANZ boss Nuno Matos issued an apology for the automated redundancy emails. Matos also said the decision was "not about profits", describing the mass sacking as "the right thing to do".

The FSU's Wendy Streets said:

‘This amounts to corporate vandalism and shows utter contempt for staff, customers and the community.’

In a comment apparently not meant to be satirical, an NAB spokesperson justified its 400-odd job cuts with the following:

"Like many businesses, we regularly look at the way we work and how we're structured to deliver the best experience we can for our customers."

The spokesperson did not elaborate on how reducing the number of people available to deal with customers would improve the “customer experience”, but since most people have experienced so-called banking customer service, it’s fair to say the majority of Australians are not holding their breath for the big reveal.

Aside from their non-existent customer service, the Big Four banks are known for overpaying their executives, underpaying workers, committing assorted data infringements – such as when personal customer information was found in a skip bin – and, oh yes, flagrantly lying and cheating.

The other thing banks are known for is, of course, making money. 

In the case of ANZ and NAB, their profits substantially increased in the last sector. ANZ recorded an after-tax profit of $3.64 billion for the half year ended 31 March 2025, up 16 per cent on the previous half. And NAB’s retained profits increased by 3.4 per cent to $870 million. 

BIGGER FOR THE BANK BENDIGO

Meanwhile, once pitched as the “community” bank, Bendigo Bank is apparently no longer satisfied with its size and wishes to join the pissing contest with the bigger guys. The bank has been slowly doing away with customer service altogether by closing as many regional banks as possible and then bragging about it. 

Bendigo Bank’s new advertising blitz coins the catchphrase, “Big on Banking. Bigger for you" — a rather implausible attempt to convince average Australians (who only ever went to Bendigo Bank precisely because it wasn’t one of the Big Four) that bigger is suddenly better.

As Dale Webster recently reported on IA, apart from sacking workers, Bendigo Bank also:

• pulled out of fundraising partnerships with community groups;
• announced the closure of ten branches and 28 agencies; and
• declared a $514.6 million profit.

This brings the total Bendigo Bank closures since 2018 to a grand total of 95 branches and 70 agencies, and leaves 56 towns with no banking services.

FSU national secretary Julia Angrisano said Bendigo Bank likes to market itself differently, it was “blindsiding” workers just like the big four banks.

She said:

'Bendigo … [is] profitable, yet loyal workers are being thrown on the scrap heap while executives pocket bonuses.'

"THE RIGHT THING TO DO"

The 2019 Banking Royal Commission’s final report on the banks and associated financial institutions exposed systemic misconduct and a culture of choosing profits over customers, which it summed up as 'a culture of greed'.

Among the many shocking misconduct findings, lowlights included:

• charging 500,000 home loan customers incorrect interest rates for over ten years;
• rewarding brokers for misleading customers into larger and longer home loans than needed;
• charging fees for non-existent services;
• foreclosing on property when customers were not in default; and even,
• continuing to charge insurance premiums to dead people.

These egregious acts took place at a time of increasing growth for the banking sector. 

During the preceding Global Financial Crisis, however, the banks also received a government bailout to the tune of $120 billion. 

Now, Australia's banks, despite their latest eye-watering profits, have sacked a massive swathe of their workforce, outsourced call centres to overseas companies and closed even more branches.

What is this story about? The profit motive is one thing, but this is not only about massive multinational corporations making mega-profits. 

It is not only about closing branches, or sacking workers, or making efficiency improvements through the use of clever algorithms, such as artificial intelligence.

This is about one of the pillars of the community, our banks – which provide jobs and safeguard our savings, and help small businesses start and succeed – abandoning their traditional role of serving the community to become profit machines.

And if we end up with no one but very wealthy men and smart computers and wastelands where people once worked and flourished, we have nothing.

This is not only the opposite of the “right thing to do”, it is, as Ms Streets put it: 

‘...unhinged, reckless, unnecessary and driven by pure greed.’

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Follow managing editor Michelle Pini on Bluesky @michellepini.bsky.social and Independent Australia on Bluesky @independentaus.bsky.social, X/Twitter @independentaus and Facebook HERE.