Santander UK is moving its call centres back to the UK.

It is returning all of its Indian call centres to the UK so that all retail banking customers ringing the bank will have their call answered by a UK-based employee, it says.

The bank has been subject to widespread criticism recently over its service levels.

Abbey outsourced its call centre operations in 2003 to two centres in India – one in Bangalore and one in Pune. All calls handled by these centres will now be dealt with by staff based in Glasgow, Leicester and Liverpool.

Santander has hired an additional 500 UK staff to handle the estimated 1.5 million calls each month. In total, Santander’s UK call centres employ 2,500 staff.

Ana Bot&iacuten, CEO of Santander UK, said: “Improving the service we offer is my top priority. Our customers tell us they prefer our call centres to be in the UK and not offshore. We have listened to the feedback and have acted by re-establishing our call centres back here.