Almost 1,000 people work at the call centre

The talks come after Lloyds TSB announced it was to close its customer contact centre in Newcastle with the loss of almost 1,000 jobs.

The bank is moving services to Bangalore in India by the end of the year.

Within hours of the announcement on Thursday morning, 200 workers signed a petition saying they wanted to be balloted for strike action.

On Friday, workers held their fourth union meeting since the announcement to discuss possible action.

Honeymoon shock

Bill Anderton, from finance union Unifi, said: "We had one member of staff who yesterday was told about the closure the day before they had finished their initial training.

"We had another staff who has just returned from honeymoon and is due to move into a new house in a couple of weeks time. Obviously a job loss is a huge blow to them.

"Halloween came a day early for workers in Newcastle contact centre."

The centre in Newcastle currently employs 986 people. Some staff are employed in part time roles, so this is equivalent to 750 full time roles.