We used to call them a hole in the wall back in the day but today that’s just what they are - a hole in the wall!

I’m referring, of course, to cashpoints at banks, both of which seem to be disappearing at an alarming rate of knots. I bank at Barclays and a few months ago I wanted to pay a cheque in. Yes, some people still use cheques! When I got there, I found two blokes bricking up the hole in the wall and the branch closed. Now luckily for me I have a car and I work in Ipswich, so I was able to go into the branch in Princes Street and pay it in. A little inconvenient for me but what if I hadn’t got transport?

I’m no luddite, I use my mobile banking app but for some people it’s just not appropriate. Yes, more people are using this way of banking but we’re leaving some folks behind here. Those who, for whatever reason and there are many of them, are not able to do this are at a distinct disadvantage.

I can scan a cheque to pay in, but I don’t because I don’t trust the technology to do it properly. I would much rather hand it over to the cashier behind their counter and know it was safely deposited. The one thing my Barclays app can’t do is allow me to pay in cash. As hard as I try, I can’t find anywhere to shove it into my mobile phone!

Cash isn’t dead. For some people it’s all they have and last time I looked it’s still legal tender. If you haven’t got much money, and believe you me I can remember what that’s like, cash is a good way of budgeting. If you haven’t got it, you can’t spend it.

I’m now the CEO of a local cancer charity, we regularly get donations paid to us in cash or cheques. Thankfully we’re based in Ipswich, and we can nip into a branch to pay it in but what if weren’t?

It would mean a goodness knows how long round trip to the nearest big town to pay it in! How do shopkeepers in some of these small town’s cope? Gone are the days when you could nip down to the local branch and pay in the day’s takings.

We’re rapidly losing that personal banking service where you could go into a branch and talk face to face with a member of staff. They would offer you help and advice on all manner of things. Yes, that’s still available online but not with the personal touch we once had. It’s just like the sketch from Little Britain:  “Computer says no.”

What about all the jobs we’re losing in the banking industry? When I left school so many of my former classmates went into banking but with so few branches left that career avenue has all but gone locally. You can walk along any high street and look at the number of former bank buildings> There are loads of them, now converted into all manner of different uses.

These days it's all about profit not people, it’s the same with supermarket checkouts disappearing as quickly as bank branches, technology is taking our jobs. With the advent of Artificial Intelligence or AI this is just the start. I dare say if I went onto an AI site and said write me a column about bank closures it would! And by the way I haven’t. So, what’s my message to bankers: "Slow down, the march of progress doesn’t have to be so fast. Think of people and not profits!