Santander retail boss to join Lloyds
Lloyds Banking Group has hired Santander’s UK retail bank boss to lead its Lloyds TSB and Bank of Scotland branch network.
Alison Brittain is the third former Santander UK executive appointed by Lloyds chief António Horta-Osório since he joined from the Spanish-owned bank at the start of the year. She will join wealth and international boss Antonio Lorenzo and risk head Juan Colombás when she arrives in September.
Her appointment comes just one week after it was announced that Helen Weir, group executive director for retail, is to retire from the banking group.
Weir’s departure led to a restructure of the group’s retail division with Lorenzo adding responsibility for marketing and product strategy across all of the group’s retail brands including Lloyds TSB, Halifax and Bank of Scotland. Further changes are expected when a strategic review led by Horta-Osório is completed later this year.
Brittain, who helped steer the rebranding of Abbey and Bradford & Bingley to Santander last year, is likely to play a leading role in the rebranding of Lloyds TSB branches to Lloyds next year. The name change, part of the restructuring plan the part-nationalised group agreed with the European Commission last year after receiving state aid, is expected to be completed by 2013.
Brittain, currently executive director for retail distribution and intermediaries at Santander UK, will oversee “an orderly transition and handover” to her yet to be hired replacement, according to Santander.
