Nearly 700 staff at department store chain Allders have been made redundant.

Kroll, which took control of the company last month, announced 461 job cuts at the stores and a further 209 at Allders' headquarters in Croydon, south London.

The redundancies are in addition to 130 cuts already made at the head office.

The administrators said the cuts, which are spread across most of its 45 stores, were necessary to remove overstaffing.

A spokesman for Kroll said: ''It was necessary to reduce the level of employment to meet the needs of each individual store.''

The hardest hit was Croydon, where 76 jobs were lost.

Talks about the sale of 34 stores are at an advanced stage and all 45 remained open. Kroll revealed on Sunday that it would have to break up the business after ten stores - including one in Clifton Moor, York - generated only "limited" interest.

Allders has another store in the centre of York and one in Knaresborough, near Harrogate. Administrators could not say last night how many jobs would be going at those outlets.