WORRIED SAVERS and investors of the troubled Northern Rock bank continued to queue up outside the High Street branch yesterday to withdraw their cash.

The bank opened an hour early at 8am to try to deal with the surge of anxious customers and queues formed immediately.

Customers were intent on withdrawing their money and many expressed their anger at the way the bank had treated them.

Despite reassurances that their money was safe, most said anxiety over their savings was too great to wait and see.

James Bain, of Broughty Ferry, was angry that he had had to wait so long to withdraw his savings and said that bank staff at the Dundee branch have not been sympathetic to customer concerns.

He said, “This is the second time I’ve been down to take my money out. We came down on Saturday and queued up for a long time but a woman working in the branch came out and cut off the queue.

“The situation has been terrible—I just want to take my money out. I can’t talk about other branches but the treatment of customers in Dundee has been shocking.”

People waiting in the queue were angry that the Northern Rock had not kept customers better informed of its financial difficulties.

John Ower, who lives in the city’s West End, was especially frustrated that the bank had not provided better facilities for older customers who fear for their life savings.

He said, “I have come down today to take all my money out. Northern Rock must have known well in advance of the trouble brewing and should have let their investors know before finding out about it on the news.

“It’s people’s life savings and you put your money in with good faith. The people in the queue are mostly older people so they should really have put more staff on in the branch to deal with it to cut down on the waiting times and they could have had a few chairs here to let some of them sit down.”

A spokesman from Northern Rock said, “Although we understand customer concerns, we are sending a message of reassurance to customers and apologise for the queues at our branches at this busy time.

“We are trying to maintain a normal service at this very busy time and are making an effort to educate our customers on the situation.

“We have extended opening times and added extra staff to our branches to try and deal with all customers.

“Our relationship with our customers is very important and the last thing we want to do is turn away anyone.

“We have tried to deal with each customer and although I am unable to comment on cases on Saturday, on Friday night in Dundee we opened until 6pm and there were no customers waiting when we closed our doors.”