Walgreen Boots Alliance has announced its intention to make some 700 admin staff redundant as part of a restructure that will see resources diverted to higher-growth areas of the business.

The US-owned pharmacy chain, regarded in the UK as a British high street institution, said that the majority of the job losses would be incurred at its UK head office in Nottingham and would be ‘non-store’.  The retailer is hoping to achieve the reduction through ‘a combination of natural attrition, redeployment, retraining and redundancy.’

The retailer said that it plans to create new roles in its bid to reinvent its customer offer and focus customer engagement. The plan is part of the expanded Walgreens Boots Alliance cost restructuring programme, set out in April, 2015.

Boots President, Simon Roberts said: “While we have continued to deliver a solid performance in recent years, despite challenging market conditions, we cannot be complacent and must be stronger and more agile going forward, to meet the fast changing expectations of our customers.”