First Active branch to close

Mullingar"s First Active Building Society will close by the end of the year - but the future for its staff is unknown. In total 45 First Active Branches will "merge" with Ulster Banks and a further 15 will switch over to the Ulster Bank brand.Mullingar is one of the towns in which the First Active branches and local Ulster Bank branches will merge.A spokeswoman for the Ulster Bank group confirmed this morning that staff will be eligible to apply for any of the 550 voluntary redundancies which will be on offer to First Active staff across the country.It is then hoped that staff who do not avail of the redundancy packages can be re-employed at their local Ulster Bank branch.First Active is the specialist mortgage and investment arm of Ulster Bank in Ireland and in a statement released yesterday the bank said that the move to a 'single brand' would strengthen the organisation in the face of 'prevailing economic conditions'.First Active branch manager in Mullingar, Gerry Egan said that he could not give details of the number of staff employed at the branch or what will happen to their jobs after the merger takes place.'I can"t say anything at all about the situation, the communications office in Dublin will have all the details on it,' he said.But a spokeswoman at the communications office said that she had no details on individual branches.The spokeswoman also said that customers need not worry about the changeover as their details will be automatically switched over to Ulster Bank and confirmed that current terms and conditions would still apply.In total 750 jobs are to go across the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland all of which will be under a voluntary redundancy scheme.