THE HEAD of strategy, marketing and communications at ACC Bank, Eddie Kingston, has left the bank after 15 years with the financial institution.
Mr Kingston joined ACC in 1994 after working with ICC Finance and Bank of Ireland Finance.
A native of Clonakilty, Co Cork, he worked in the leasing unit of the bank and as head of sales before joining the bank’s executive management team in 2003.
A spokeswoman for the bank said that Mr Kingston had decided to leave the bank at the end of this month after “a long and dedicated career” with the company.
Mr Kingston could not be reached for comment.
The bank said in May that it was cutting 200 jobs, almost a third of its Irish workforce, and closing 16 of its 25 branches, blaming the sharp deterioration in the economy and the property market.
The bank made a pretax loss of €244 million in 2008, compared with a pretax profit of €42.6 million the previous year, after losses primarily on property and construction loans surged. The amount set aside to cover bad loans increased to €306.5 million from €12 million a year earlier.
The bank’s spokesman said that no staff had been made redundant since the job cuts were announced and that talks with trade unions and employees was “ongoing”.
The bank announced the job cuts and plans to reduce payroll and non-payroll costs by at least 30 per cent in a move to manage the risks in the bank’s loan book.
The bank has a large exposure to the property and construction sector across its €6.5 billion loan book.
ACC, which is owned by Dutch group Rabobank, has been aggressively pursuing bad loans through the courts and has taken a number of Commercial Court cases against high-profile developers.
