Union Will Offer Sunday Banking at 50 Markets

Union Bank said Tuesday it will become the first major bank in California to offer Sunday hours through 50 branches it plans to open in supermarkets starting in January.

The announcement from Union, the state’s fifth-largest bank, marks yet another volley in the retail banking wars in California this year. Already this year, banks have opened on Saturdays, extended their hours during the week and offered incentives, such as $5 payments to customers who must wait in a teller line longer than five minutes.

Union is not the first bank in the state to launch Sunday hours, nor is it the first to open branches in supermarkets. Two smaller banks, Antelope Valley Bank in Lancaster and Fremont Bank near San Francisco, have disclosed plans to offer Sunday banking next month, also through supermarket branches.

Sunday banking has been common in other major cities. And thrifts have experimented with Sunday hours for years, often with little success.

One Los Angeles-based savings and loan, California Federal Bank, currently has two branches open on Sundays. Citicorp Savings, part of New York-based Citicorp, has an experimental program with three branches open on Sundays in Ralphs stores in the San Fernando Valley.

Union’s move, the biggest so far by a commercial bank, comes at a time when major banks are desperately trying to get the attention of consumers.

Week after week, banks have announced programs, many of them gimmicky, to attract business. The consumer area--including credit cards, home-equity loans and other home mortgages--is lucrative and has grown increasingly important to California banks in the wake of bad Latin American loans and troubled real estate loans in Texas and Arizona.

Officials at other major banks in California, however, gave no indication of whether they might follow Union’s lead. First Interstate Bank of California, for example, said its studies found no need for Sunday hours because customer demand is met by Saturday hours and extended hours.

James R. Gibson, Union Bank vice chairman, said the bank has been considering Sunday hours for two years, adding that it will cost $12 million to install the branches. Union Bank is controlled by the Bank of Tokyo, which owns 76% of Union.

Union said it will open the first 15 branches in Ralphs markets, five in San Diego and nearly all of the other 10 in stores in Los Angeles County. Locations of 35 other branches have not yet been determined.

Gibson said studies have shown that the second-busiest day for supermarkets is Sunday, and the bank hopes to pick up business it otherwise would not get.