Five-year-old boy wanders into closed bank left unlocked for 19 hours

But as five-year-old Oliver Pettigrew discovered, none of that counts when someone forgets to lock up.

The inquisitive youngster was able to wander into a rural branch through the unsecured front door while his mother and father were using the cashpoint outside.

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He wandered around inside before emerging to say: "Dad, the bank's open."

"At first I thought he was joking and I said 'Yeah, right,' said Daniel Pettigrew, a 50-year-old company director.

"But it was."

He went inside with his son and they walked up to the safe and noticed thousands of pounds worth of computer equipment in full view.

Thankfully for the bank, the Pettigrews are a law-abiding bunch and they called 999 then stood guard until the police arrived at the branch in Easingwold, North Yorkshire.

The incident happened at lunchtime on Saturday, meaning the door had been unlocked for 19 hours since closing time on Friday afternoon. Alison Pettigrew, 44, said: "I was at the cash machine and my husband started saying, 'Where's Oliver? where's Oliver?' Then he appeared. He and his dad ended up wandering around the place, which was totally deserted."

Her husband added: "We saw the big safe right in front of us.

"I wish I'd taken a picture of it. There were computers and walkie-talkies lying around in there. Anyone could have stolen them. The hard drives were there too.

"In the current climate it makes you wonder if anyone could have got to the database with customers' bank details on it. There were no alarms going off or anything like that."

The bank's security company sent a worker to lock up and the blunder was blamed on a door catch "malfunction".

But Mr Pettigrew, who lives in Easingwold and runs a training consultancy in York, was astonished by HSBC's apparent lack of concern.

"Nobody even phoned us to say thank you," he said. "When I phoned the regional department and told them about it, they didn't even know what had happened. They then sent Oliver a letter saying he had saved the day.

"They offered him a book token, but I told them he had always wanted his own bank card and asked if they would open an account for him. So they did and put £10 in it."

A spokesman for HSBC said: "Basically, what happened was there was a malfunction with the door catch.

"Once the door was pushed open it would have alerted the police anyway.

"It was very sweet of Mr Pettigrew and his son to do the right thing and alert the police and we opened an account for him to say thank you."

She said the doors were all part of a CCTV network and linked to London, so security would have been alerted once the door was opened.

However police confirmed that the only alarm call they received was from Mr Pettigrew.