Insurance firm RSA is cutting 1,200 jobs in the UK,
including IT roles.
The company, which employs almost 9,000 people, wants to save
£70m by the middle of next year.
RSA today posted a profit of £586m after tax for the full year
2008, which was 7% more than the £628m reported in 2007.
RSA did not go into detail about where the cuts would be made
but said,"These cuts will affect all parts of the business at all
levels."
IT underpins all parts of financial services firms, and IT
workers are often amongthe hardest hit in a downturn. Financial
services firms see IT and back-office functions as surplus to
requirements when business levels fall.
HSBC cut 1,100 jobs in its investment banking division in
September, including 500 front- and back-office jobs in London.
Credit Suisse, which made a loss in the third quarter of this
year of £704m, has announced 650 job cuts, including IT support
functions.
Citigroup
plans to cut its global workforce by 52,000 jobs across all
businesses and geographies in the near future. Citigroup CEO Vikram
Pandit revealed last month that the bank would cut 20% of its
employees at the group.
Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is
expected to make thousands of job cutsas it comes to terms with
the economic slowdown.
Barclays is also expected to cut IT jobs at its FirstPlus loans
business as it closes to new business. It will keep its IT
infrastructure to process existing customer loans, but is scaling
it back.