Part
One - Segmentation
Just
a few short years ago the banks generally treated
everybody the same. The few who got the better recognition
and service were large borrowers. Investors with the
banks never got the same status or service when comparing
similar amounts. The bank's lenders were the elite.
Recently,
however, the banks have discovered segmentation, differentiating
the service standards delivered, based on the amount
of money the banks were making out of them. Obviously
the more money the bank was making out of you the
better the service you would receive and the easier
the access to the person you were to deal with at
the bank.
It
is interesting to note this is for frontline service
(the people you deal with face to face) but everybody
gets the same back office service (the people behind
the scene who are supposed to dot the i's and cross
the t's). From my experience, it is this area that
the banks have let slip and is the cause of most of
the frustrations people have with their banks today.
People are tired of bank errors (mostly anyway); the
couple in Rangiora who got $62 million from the BNZ
won't be complaining). It would be interesting to
compare the number of bank errors now to those in
the past. I doubt that the statistics would be available
but suspect errors have risen sharply over the last
10 years. Whatever happened to the notion "Do
it right the first time!" It is, after all, cost
effective.
With
the "everyone is equal" service being provided
at branch level, prior to the introduction of segmentation
meant the average customer was being over-serviced
(in the bank's opinion, obviously, not the customer's)
with the existing branch structures, locations and
size. The banks then took action to reduce costs.
The
introduction of technology, via phone banking, EFTPOS
and internet banking, meant the banks could still
deliver basic service at much reduced costs and keep
customer dissatisfaction to a manageable level, while
they quickly closed, downsized or amalgamated branches,
with the resulting staff redundancies.
Branch
managers today have lost the status that they once
enjoyed, as recently as ten years ago. This is due
in most parts to the fact that the bank managers in
branches no longer have any ability to approve business
lending - some enlightened banks have kept some housing
lending ability within the branch, but I am not aware
of many. I believe it is fair to say that in most
cases, branch managers are better described as sales
coaches and their primary responsibility is to ensure
their branch makes its weekly, monthly, and annual
sales targets. I would be interested to know whether
the banks of today reward or recognise the individuals
or branches that still provide good service - and
there are still many worthy of this acclaim. I think
not!
