Bank officials have said they will picket Bank of Ireland's training division on Friday as a dispute over outsourcing intensifies.

Representatives of both sides met for talks yesterday under the mediation of Kieran Mulvey, chief executive of the Labour Relations Commission (LRC). The talks were adjourned yesterday evening and Mr Mulvey will "tic-tac" between both sides, according to an IBOA spokesman.

The dispute centres on the terms of an agreement reached last year, which would see training activities carried out by Bank of Ireland retail learning outsourced to Accenture, the management consultancy and business services firm.

The IBOA claims staff working in this area have the choice of taking redundancy, redeploying within the bank or moving to Accenture. It claims the bank is in breach of the agreement because it has put limits on the number of redeployment and redundancy opportunities.

The deal was negotiated last year under the auspices of Mr Mulvey as an independent facilitator and not in his official role of chief executive of the LRC. Under the terms of the agreement, disputes can be referred back to him for arbitration. His rulings are then binding on both sides. Normal LRC rulings are not binding.

As well as picketing the bank's training operation from next Friday, the IBOA has also threatened to withdraw co-operation on the wider cost-cutting programme agreed with the bank last year, which will save €120 million by 2009.

The bank will publish its results for the year to the end of March on May 31st. These are expected to show cost savings of €35 million, as the first element of the package of measures agreed last year takes effect.