Bank of America is looking to slash about 8,000 jobs as digital banking gains momentum and drop in the numbers of customer visiting its branches.

BofA

The layoffs will mostly impact the employees working in its back office operations and teller positions, CNN Money reported, citing a source familiar with the matter.

However, the biggest US lender by deposits will not cut jobs immediately and plans to partly offset the impact by hiring sales staff, mortgage loan officers, personal investment advisers and small business bankers.

Despite this, the bank’s headcount is expected to decline by thousands as its customers increasing prefer to do banking on desktops and smartphones instead of walking into bank branches, The Financial Times reported.

Bank of America’s co-head of consumer banking Thong Nguyen said at an industry conference: ""Our strategy is putting everything on the mobile phone. If you have a thumb, you can bank.

"That’s where a lot of our strategy is going to move going forward."

The bank has already reduced its total headcount by 37% to 68,000 by the end of March quarter this year compared to 107,900 in 2009. Its branch network has declined by 23% to 4,689.

On the other hand, the bank witnessed a sharp increase in automated transactions to 68% from 35% in 2009.

Citigroup in a recent report said that the retail banking automation could lead a further reduction in bank jobs by 30% between 2015 and 2025.

Nguyen said: "You used to come to a branch to make a deposit, a withdrawal, or payments. Now you’re going to use the branch to go in and open a credit card, an auto loan, a mortgage, investment."


Image: The Bank of America Tower in New York City. Photo courtesy of User Jleon/Wikipedia.