INSURANCE giant AXA is to axe the jobs of 133 financial planners it employs in branches of Clydesdale and Yorkshire banks but is unable to say how many posts will go in the Scotland “region”.

The decision to close its banking advice arm comes just four years after the French company took over the function from in-house teams at Glasgow-headquartered Clydesdale.

With AXA also closing its financial planning business at Co-operative Bank branches, 450 roles will be cut across the UK. Asked how many jobs will go in Scotland, a spokeswoman said: “It is really hard to get any number for the loss of roles in any particular region.”

The job losses follow similar moves elsewhere as new rules forced financial advisers to charge fees.

Royal Bank of Scotland is cutting 600 financial planning roles, including 80 in Scotland, and Lloyds Banking Group, owner of Bank of Scotland, another 1000.

Paul Evans, chief executive of AXA UK, said: “Following similar announcements by major retail banks, we are very disappointed that AXA UK must also now withdraw this service having not found a model which balanced the regulatory requirement that the service be profitable in its own right, whilst setting advice fees at an affordable level.”

Clydesdale transferred its financial planning service, and 129 employees, to AXA in February 2009. At the time 50 Scottish employees of Clydesdale and another 28 elsewhere in the UK lost their jobs and 143 moved to other roles in the bank.

The most recent changes come at a time of great change at Clydesdale, which is owned by National Australia Bank, as chief executive David Thorburn oversees the scaling back of the bank following large losses on property loans.

A Clydesdale spokeswoman said: “AXA will be writing to customers and providing them with details of independent financial advisers they may choose to use in the future. This decision does not impact on any of the advice our customers have received, nor on any policies they hold.”