Nordea to cut 6,000 jobs in next 4 years

The Nordic banking giant Nordea announced on Thursday its plan to shed 6,000 jobs during the next four years, and gave one of the reasons as the replacement of human positions by "robots".

Nordea has currently nearly 32,000 employees. CEO Casper von Koskull emphasized in a statement the need to cut costs and to improve efficiency were the reasons for the upcoming layoffs.

The layoffs include 2,000 consultant tasks that are currently outsourced. How the sackings will be distributed in the Nordic area cannot be specified yet.

Nordea said it is introducing "robots" that respond to customer questions online. One such has began work in Norway in September and has already responded to 10,000 questions previously handled by staffers.

In Finland, robot service begins in December. Von Koskull said "artificial intelligence" will improve the customer experience.

Some jobs described as "routine" will be transferred to Poland. Salary levels in Finland and the other Nordics are higher than in Poland.

The news came two days after Nordea announced it had begun cooperation with Apple-pay, now available in the Nordic area.

Local analysts have pointed out that after a couple of years Apple and comparable companies could be severe competitors to traditional banks.

After a change of legislation next year, banks in Finland must allow access to a customer's account to outside services, if the customer permits.

Local media noted the Nordea announcement brings recollections of the 1990s. During that decade the number of jobs in banking in Finland reduced from 55,000 to 25,000 employees.

The Nordea employee union received the news "with dismay as the bank is very profitable now".

Nordea published its Q3 results on Thursday, and its profit declined by five percent to 1,090 million euros.