This bank is run by the goblins, and its vaults are located hundreds of miles underground. There is even a legend (or truth) that the guardians of the underground vaults are dragons.
As you approach the building, you find very polished bronze doors where an elf stands guard, wearing a red and gold uniform. After this door is an entrance hall with two more goblins standing guard and silver doors where the following poem is engraved:
Enter, stranger, but take heed Of what awaits the sin of greed, For those who take, but do not earn, Must pay most dearly in their turn, So if you seek beneath our floors A treasure that was never yours, Thief, you have been warned, beware Of finding more than treasure there.
Through these doors, you come to a great marble hall. There, more than a hundred goblins are sitting on high benches behind a long counter, writing in large ledgers, weighing coins on brass scales, examining precious stones with jewelers' glasses. In Gringotts, you can exchange money, exchange muggles for witches' money. There are many doors in this hall, all guarded by goblins, who accompany people entering or leaving. There is no more marble passing through these doors, but narrow stone passages, on the way down, lit by torches, leading to the underground vaults.
An elf serves as a guide in this labyrinth, piloting a wagon that he calls with a whistle. In fact, it seems as if the wagon runs alone and at high speed.
The vaults, of which there are more than seven hundred, can be opened in various ways. The ordinary ones use a small key. The high-security ones have incantations on the doors and have no locks. The vault from which Hagrid took the philosopher's stone, for example, belongs to Dumbledore, its number is 713, and it was opened with magic.
The goblin smoothed the door with his long finger, and it dissolved, but if someone other than a de Gringotts goblin tried to do this, he would be swallowed by the door and be trapped inside.
Sirius Black's safe has the number 711, and Harry's is 687.
One of Gringotes' best-known employees is Bill Weasley, who worked in Egypt, breaking curses from places like the pyramids to recover treasures for the bank.
When he returns to help in the fight against Voldemort, he finds Fleur Delacour also working at the Gringotts to improve her English. After Voldemort's return, the security of the bank has been increased.