RBS appoints head of UK branches

Royal Bank of Scotland has appointed Ross McEwan as head of its UK-wide branch banking network.

RBS retail division serves 19 million customers through branch and direct channels trading under the NatWest and RBS names. The division has more than £100 billion in customer assets and made an operating profit in 2011 of £2 billion.

McEwan joins RBS from the Commonwealth Bank of Australia where he has been in charge of the retail bank since 2007. It is Australia’s largest retail bank with more than 10 million customers and 16,500 staff.

A native of New Zealand he takes over at his role at RBS in June, succeeding Brian Hartzer.