I am a long time member of the Co-Op bank, which has never let me down (but singing the praises of…read moreone of the few ethical banks on the high street is another matter). This branch is always efficient, rather sedate, none of that high street bank 'crowd' feel. They are rather old fashioned, like banks used to be and you don't feel you are in the grip of a purely commercially motivated enterprise.

HSBC does all the normal things a bank does, but what really struck me when I last went in was…read moretheir poor customer service. If I go in the Halifax and there's a long queue, someone usually comes over and asks me if they can help or shows me a machine I can use. Not so in HSBC. There's always a queue when I go in, and it's very slow-moving. Note: this is for the customer service desk, so if you want to see a advisor. If you want a quick deposit or withdrawal, it's not so bad. I went to open a society account, so we needed to see an advisor as a group. We were told quite impatiently to sit down in the corner and fill out some forms, as if were were wasting their time. They didn't provide pens or any explanation, but we filled them out and waited. And waited, and waited. We were there for over 30 minutes and saw everyone who'd been in the queue behind us go in. Eventually we joined the queue again to ask what had happened and again they looked at us as if we were really causing them an inconvenience. The advisor was much nicer when we did actually speak to him, but the customer service was appalling before that, and it's those people who create the main impression.

Does what you'd expect an HSBC bank to do. I prefer not to go into the bank these days, but if you…read moreneed to the staff at this branch are helpful and friendly, and dont make you feel too small.

The waiting times at the Cornmarket branch are particularly long, 45 minutes is quite normal…read more Moreover, the fees of Barclays are diametric to the quality of their service. I have a number of international bank accounts and the fees at Barclays are significantly higher (for instance: My Swiss bank charges me 3 pounds for a transfer to a Euro-account, Barclays charges 15). Paying with my debit card in a currency other than pounds incurs a fee of 2.5% (0%-1.5% at my other banks). The high fees are paired with 0% interest. Once, Barclays closed my online account because they found one of my transactions suspicious -- without notifying me (the online banking website just showed an "page not found error" instead of a more informative "login failed" message). When I called them, they claimed that everything is fine and tried to convince me to open a savings account instead. After a week, when online banking still didn't work for me, I went to the branch (45 minutes queuing again) where they were finally able to resolve the issue. They said they couldn't contact me because they assumed my email address and my phone (!) were also compromised (They could've at least called me and asked me to show up in person). As another reviewer said: The staff is usually friendly, but that's little consolation. Barclays will have to do much better before I do more than occasional banking with them.

The main branch of Barclays in Oxford is really big, and it can take a while to get served at the…read morecounter. If you want to speak to a financial advisor, you could be in for a very long wait! On the plus side, the branch is well laid out and quite pleasant to be in. There are ample cash machines and deposit boxes, and the stationary (paying-in slips etc) are always well stocked up. If you have another branch of Barclays local to you I woudl advise you to go there instead rather than braving the queues in the city centre!

Abbey is one of those standard banks that does everything okay, but doesn't really stand out, to me…read moreat least. It was taken over by Santander recently, so will probably be stronger than it would have been in the current financial market. But hey, you probably know all that already. In terms of practicalities, there are a couple of other Abbey stores in Oxford, and they're all over the country, so it's a useful bank to use. The staff in this branch are usually very friendly and helpful and they are happy to offer advice without you committing to anything. The branch is quite small, but I've never had to queue very long, and it feels cosier than some of the banks in the centre of town.

Located on Banbury Road, this cash machine is quite useful if you are popping into Summertown for…read moresome shopping. It can be difficult to stop a car next to here as Banbury Road is quite busy. There is also an attached Lloyds bank if you need any other financial services.

Friendly staff, only a small branch but I have never had to wait long in there to be dealt with…read more The staff are fully knowledgeable and have always been able to answer any queries I have had.