Pods emerge in open bank branch design

WISE  INVESTMENT: Dave  Tatelbaum, proprietor of the Dartmouth Big Value store, speaks with BayCoast Bank teller Stephanie Pires. The bank recently opened a new location featuring a pod design. / PBN PHOTO/ MICHAEL SALERNO
WISE INVESTMENT: Dave Tatelbaum, proprietor of the Dartmouth Big Value store, speaks with BayCoast Bank teller Stephanie Pires. The bank recently opened a new location featuring a pod design. / PBN PHOTO/ MICHAEL SALERNO

Bank branches are shedding the stodgy image. Structured spaces and teller lines are coming down and technology stations are entering, aimed at consumers who are comfortable with using digital devices for financial transactions.

The trend toward a more open design of interior space, with mobile stations that allow bank employees to directly interact with the customers who do come in and need assistance, emerged a decade ago. But in recent years it has become more common as more customers move online for basic transactions, and expect a more pleasant experience in the branch itself.

In Dartmouth, BayCoast Bank recently opened a new bank featuring a “pod” design, in which bank employees can move around and speak with or assist customers. Nearby, a coffee bar allows everyone to help themselves.

If it doesn’t resemble the secure-as-a-fortress bank designs of the past, that’s because cash is no longer exchanged on the retail floor.

- Advertisement -

Designed by Vision 3 Architects, of Providence, the branch includes an Interactive Teller Machine, which allows customers in Dartmouth to speak with a bank employee based in the bank’s Swansea headquarters. This has allowed the bank to offer extended-service hours in Dartmouth, even if the employee is based in another town.

“We call it the virtual bank,” said Ann Ramos Desrosiers, senior vice president and chief community banking officer for BayCoast Bank. “The concept is to be more consultative.”

The community bank, based in Swansea, has 17 branches in southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

The branch in Dartmouth opened in April and features mobile “pods” that allow bank employees to circulate and work with customers who have various needs. Two more branch locations are planned for similar upgrades, in Seekonk and downtown New Bedford, according to Ramos Desrosiers.

The initial feedback from customers, she said, is sometimes surprise at what they see inside the building. “People love it. It doesn’t feel like a bank.”

The trend in design for banks, for several years, has been moving away from traditional structure and toward convenience, according to Keith Davignon, principal architect at Vision 3 Architects.

This evolution was seen as far back as the 1980s and 1990s in development of drive-through and drive-up banking lanes, he said. In more recent years, technology enhancements placed in the branches allow customers to perform certain transactions without assistance.

Some of the new technology in the BayCoast branch, for example, uses touch screens that enable customers to cash checks or make loan payments, according to Ramos Desrosiers.

Younger customers, including those who belong to the millennial generation, often do not visit a bank branch at all. The advent of mobile banking and digital apps on phones have eliminated the necessity of using a branch for many customers.

Vision 3 Architects has redesigned bank branch interiors or completed new construction for numerous clients in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, including Pawtucket Credit Union, Bank Rhode Island, BankFive and Santander Bank.

In general, bank clients recognize that younger people are not accessing branches, but a good portion of the existing customer base predates the digital era. Baby boomers, for example, who may be 51 to 75 years old, “are not living online, off their cellphones,” Davignon said.

For older generations of banking customers, the experience is evolving as well. They may need assistance, but no longer the services of tellers for routine transactions. The new design takes those needs into account, said Ramos Desrosiers.

And the new approach extends to job titles, as well. Instead of tellers, the bank has “universal bankers” who work among customers. As for the formal structure of the teller line, surveys have indicated customers do not like the partitions, in which they try to speak to bank employees through glass. It can be difficult to have a conversation and people want to be able to interact when they speak with a bank representative, she said.

The purpose of the new design? It’s to stay relevant as routine transactions leave the branches, she said. “This is the way things are moving.” •

No posts to display