Bank of American downtown branch to close

ALBANY — The Bank of America branch at 128 S. Washington St. is scheduled to close permanently on Feb. 8.

Britney Sheehan, media relations manager for the Charlotte-based BOA, said the decision to close came with a decline in transaction customers — those making visits to the facility itself.

Sheehan said bank customers nationwide are trending more toward automatic teller machines and online transactions.

“Generally, all the branches are down,” Sheehan said. “Bank of America makes those decisions based on a proper balance of considerations. It was not a decision that was taken lightly.”

Bank of America once occupied the entire multi-story facility at Washington and Oglethorpe. The facility was once considered the main location for Albany, a status that has now been assume by the branch near Albany Mall.

The facility, in its heyday, was filled with Bank of America staffers. Before it became Bank of America, the facility was home to C&S Bank, which occupied that building and adjacent buildings.

Newspaper reports in Charlotte, where BOA is headquartered, reported the the nation’s second-largest lender by deposits has closed 262 banking centers since the beginning of 2011, around 31 percent of them in lower income neighborhoods.

Citing a report from banking research firm SNL Financial, BOA closed 157 of the 760 branches closed by all banks nationally in the year ending June 30, more than double the level of the next bank on the list.

BOA Chief Executive Brian Moynihan announced he plans to slash $5 billion in annual expenses by eliminating 750 locations over the next few years.