Thursday, 3 August 2017

What are banks for?

On my way to the hairdresser's, I dropped in to a local corner shop. I bought a sandwich, a bottle of water and a loaf. Total cost: £3.83.

I handed over a tenner. There was a  pause and the man behind the counter asked: "I don't suppose you've got anything smaller?"

I rootled around in my purse and eventually came up with the right money.

He was pathetically grateful: "Change is like gold dust these days," he said. "It's the ATM outside. It only gives twenties. People come in all the time. Buy one wee thing at the counter so they can get change. Why can't the ATM give out tenners and fivers?"

That is an excellent question.

Up until five years ago, my very prosperous area of East Renfrewshire had 4 bank branches and maybe 4 or even 5 building society branches. Now we have 2 bank branches and 2 building society branches. To an extent, I can see why: people use online banking.

I suspect, though, that here we prefer not to go near a branch of any bank or building society for reasons no one in the bank will admit.

It's all becoming more and more the situation as it used to be in France a generation ago: there you had to set aside half a day for any bank visit: "That's me off to the bank, chérie. I'll see you at lunchtime." You had to have a code to get in in the first place. Then you queued to speak to a teller. The teller filled in a form, handed it to you and waved you off to the cashier's desk. You queued again and eventually you got your money and could emerge blinking into the sunlight, wondering what the hell time it was and if there wasn't a better way to do all this.

Confession: I usually only go into my local branch because the ATM outside doesn't give me the notes I need to pay my cleaners. There's a queue. Always. This is partly due to the closure of all the branches round about. Doesn't matter what time I go in, I'll have to stand for up to 15 minutes. I have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Standing is not really an option for me. Today, after I'd queued and finally got the notes I wanted, the teller asked if I would like 'a review of your savings. We can make an appointment now.' So no money for more staff out front, but staff available to get me to give rbs my money to invest. I turned her down.

There used to be 4 counters in my branch. Now there are two plus a wall of machines, none of them providing the service people want. Yesterday, the machine that dealt with business deposits was out of order. That helped a lot - not. The people at the remaining two counters deal with everything. Bank loans, mortgages...It seems there's no one at the back to take away customers needing further detailed help, give them a cup of coffee and talk through whatever it is they want to ask.

I've complained. Of course I've complained. I even spoke to the manager on the phone about the number of elderly and disabled customers he had standing around for long periods waiting to speak to someone. Next time I went in there was still a queue but 3 chairs had appeared.

Maybe we should try the Thai approach to queuing:

Very civilised.

I keep coming back to this - and I know it's a cliche: rbs belongs to us. We bought the bank 9 years ago after they had made a monumental arse of their business. I don't trust them to do the right thing. Why should I? And on the current showing, I don't trust them to treat their customers right either.

When I got home today, there was an email from rbs asking me to complete a 'customer satisfaction survey' following on my (unavoidable) visit to the branch. I repeated all the things I've written here. Will it make a difference? I doubt it.

1 comment:

  1. If its any consolation, the services are almost the same every where, at least it is out here in California. Slow and largely unsatisfying.

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