RBS Clients May Still Take Up Wimbledon Seats

The 528 seats that Royal Bank of Scotland had bought for the Wimbledon fortnight may not be left empty even after the bailed-out bank cancelled all its corporate hospitality to allow its top staff to focus on the ongoing computer crisis that has affected up to 13 million customers.

RBS intends to allow the top clients it had invited to the watch the tennis to take up their tickets anyway - although the lavish hospitality suite will not be used and bankers will not be there to entertain them.

The bank has booked 48 seats for each of the first nine days of Wimbledon on Centre Court and number one court and then 24 on Centre Court for the last four days.

RBS said that it was cancelling the hospitality because of the "technical issues" that it acknowledges have caused "considerable disruption to many of our retail and business customers, as well as customers of other banks". It went ahead with the hospitality on Monday and Tuesday - using around 96 tickets - but has called off all further formal entertainment from Wednesday.

'We have made significant progress in resolving the issues and are working around the clock to put things right for our customers. Under the circumstances, we felt it would be inappropriate to provide client hospitality at Wimbledon. Our people are focused on resuming normal service for our customers as soon as possible', the bank said.

It is understood that the face value of the tickets being offered to the clients at Wimbledon is less than £100, so customers should not face breaching the Bribery Act. Other hospitality events have also been cancelled by the bank. NatWest sponsors cricket but will cancel the one day of hospitality it had arranged with clients at Lord's on Friday where England are playing Australia.

A one day golf tournament at Gleneagles in Scotland has also been called off.

This article was written by Jill Treanor, for guardian.co.uk on Wednesday 27th June 2012 12.49 Europe/London