The boss of RBS International has told Business News the business is acting on feedback from customers by planning to appoint a new head to lead its banking operations in the island.

Andrew McLaughlin, chief executive of RBS International said: ’We are advertising for a new leader for the business, head of local banking in the Isle of Man.

’And I have to say we have been greatly encouraged by the amount of interest there has been in that role.

’It’s a real sign that people are willing to look at banking and look at our business as a good place to work.

’We went through a long period after the financial crisis when that wasn’t the case .

’So this is a sign that things are starting to change.

’We expect to make that appointment before the end of this month. There will be a new local leader in the Isle of Man.’

Asked if this will boost the company’s identity specifically in the island, he said: ’That is a very fair point. When I go up to the Isle of Man, and I’m there regularly, among the feedback I get is that our bank, in fact all the banks, in the last 10 years, kind of, have organised themselves around areas of [banking] activity rather than the place.

’We got good feedback from government, from our colleagues and from our customers and the business community to say, that it is time to think about who is the absolute leader of the business end to end in the Isle of Man, leader of the jurisdiction, rather than the leader of the operations, someone who is leader of this and that.’

He said he had been told: ’’Go on Andrew, give us a local leader, who we can recognise and interact with.’’

’So we have taken that feedback on board. I think it was a fair criticism and we have acted on it and we hope to have appointed that person in the next two weeks.’

RBS International is one of the island’s largest employers, with the figure currently standing at 493 said Mr McLaughlin.

RBS International’s operations in the island include branches of the Isle of Man Bank, and an office base at Howard Pearson House at Summerhill Office Park.

Mr McLaughlin said the decision had been made to make the island the banking centre for its mortgages business across all the jurisdictions coveredby RBS International.

Those working from Pearson House provide services to customers across all of the Channel Islands, Gibraltar, Luxembourg , London and for customers across the world.

’It’s a real hub for us, as well as that front that everybody sees at places such as Athol Street and elsewhere.

He stressed the importance of the work done from the island.

RBS International announced on Friday that it had returned a pre-tax operating profit of £336 million in 2018.

Mr McLaughlin told Business News: ’I’m pleased on behalf of all my colleagues.It is a very strong set of results.’

He added: Our 2018 financial results reflect four years of hard work to build a strong and sustainable bank.

’We’ve invested heavily in our service proposition and we’ve grown our funds business through investment in the UK and Europe.

’We’re excited to be going into 2019 as a stand-alone bank outside of the ring-fence. We still have a long way to go but our new three year strategy will help us achieve our ambition to be the easiest bank to deal with for our customers.’