Management at Ulster Bank have been left red-faced after it was disclosed students were offered tickets for an afternoon strip show for opening a new account.
Ulster Bank was forced to pull the plug on the promotion after complaints new teenage clients would be treated to exotic dancers.
Freshers at the Institute of Technology Tallaght in south Dublin rushed to open accounts in return for seeing scantily-clad women and €100 in their student account.
It is understood the event at the off-campus Metro bar, in Tallaght, was organised by the students' union.
Suzanne Keegan, whose 18-year-old son was among the new intakes, claimed the bank had stooped to a new low to attract young customers.
‘The banks have got very low. But this is just immoral,’ said Ms Keegan.
‘He is 18 and if he wanted to go to a strip show there's nothing I could do about it, but I think it's the wrong association for a bank.
‘There was a throng of young people, could you imagine all the young males, they all booted it over to the Metro’, she said.
Ulster Bank reps had been handing out tickets for the exotic event along with a goodie bag to new student customers.
In a statement the bank - which is owned by Royal Bank of Scotland - said it withdrew its association with the promotion once it realised what the tickets were for.
‘In line with Ulster Bank's ongoing support for student events across the country, we can confirm that as part of our student campaign in IT Tallaght we promoted a freshers' week event to be held at the Metro bar,’ said a spokeswoman.
‘Ulster Bank has no involvement in the organisation of this event and once the nature of the event was realised, the Bank immediately withdrew any association with the event.’
However, the college was quick to distance itself from the bank.
A spokeswoman said: ‘Institute of Technology Tallaght has no association with Ulster Bank and has no further comment.’
The Union of Students in Ireland said it had no say on what individual committees organised, while the Tallaght students' union had no comment.
It is understood the Metro bar has cancelled the exotic dancers, which were booked to perform at 3pm on Thursday September 24.
Women's rights group said they were appalled at the idea of the event.
Susan McKay, director of the National Women's Council of Ireland, said ‘It is a completely inappropriate thing for a bank to be proposing’.
‘It's important that people understand that this isn't just a bit of a laugh.
‘Many of the women working in that kind of trade, on the fringes of the sex trade, are extremely exploited.
Ms McKay said there was also no excuse for the bank not to know it was involved in such a demeaning event.
‘I wouldn't organise an event if I didn't know the details of it,’ she added.
‘Women in USI should also organise against this type of thing being organised for freshers, it's anti-feminist and anti-women,’ she claimed.
