After six weeks we all met up back at Head Office for the next stage of our accelerated training program. When I say ‘all’, I really mean to say ‘the survivors’.

The Asian and one of the women had lasted just a week. As had one of the ‘normal’ recruits. The hippie drug addict lasted five weeks but only managed to make it in to work on the first Monday – he never managed another Monday. He then didn’t manage to make it in to work for ten days on the trot. The hippie wasn’t on the phone so eventually the Manager called at his flat on the way to the branch. The hippie answered the door in just his boxer shorts looking seriously hung over and bleary eyed. When asked when they could expect to see him at work again he replied, “When the vibes feel right, man”. Brilliant!

The dismissal notice was hand delivered later that afternoon. Shame, I liked him.

My two years spent at the first branch were not all bad. For instance there were the Bank Holidays to look forward to. Once the fog was so bad we were sent home early. That was fun.

I had my most entertaining day of my banking career ever working at this branch. It was the day of the bomb alert. The branch I was working in was situated quite close to the main train station. At the time the IRA had extended its lethal bombing campaign to mainland Britain. No town center was safe from these nasty bastards.

One morning we got a notice from the police to evacuate the area. An old Ford Transit van with Northern Ireland number plates had been left for nearly 24 hours in the short stay car park at the station. There was a suspicious looking box in the back of the van and the bomb squad had cordoned off the area.

The bank in its wisdom had sent a memo to all office managers instructing them to formulate plans for such an eventuality. The office manager now read these instructions out to the assembled staff.

He had already prepared notices to put in the windows to advise customers why the bank was closed. All of the staff was to assemble in a safe place except for four male members of staff. These four were instructed to stand in front of the plate glass windows around the bank building to ensure that customers didn’t hang around outside where they would be in potential danger of serious injury from flying glass.I kid you not.

“And what about us, the four male members of staff?” I asked.

“Er… how do you mean?” He wasn’t quick this guy.

“ERR…I mean what about us and any potentially dangerous flying glass?”

Silence greeted me. All the staff was staring at the office manager, waiting for him to explain this rather bizarre aspect of his well thought out plan.

Still silence. I broke it for him.

“Tell you what,” I said, “while you stand outside that bloody great plate glass window thinking about it, wearing that ill fitting pin striped suit for protection, me and the other guys will go join the ladies somewhere safe. OK?”

With that we left and spent a pleasant couple of hours in the Town Square, chatting and drinking coffee.

It was home time when we heard the controlled explosion and were thankful that the noise wasn’t louder and more significant.

Quite rightly the bomb squad had not taken any chances. They sent in a remote controlled robot device on caterpillar tracks, fitted with a rifle and an explosive charge. After checking the area for secondary booby traps, the robot approached the back of the van. Using the rifle it blew off the door lock and used its robot arms to open the van doors. Then it placed the explosive charge against the suspect box and retreated to a safe distance.