I wish it weren’t the case, but most banks make for an easy target when it comes to lack of customer service. Case in point: I recently visited an ATM near my house to find it covered in green paint. Green is for money… right? Well, not in this case. Obviously someone had tagged it.
Being a civic-minded guy, I noted an 800 number on the ATM to report problems, so I called them. Here’s how it went:
- Voice Recording: “Thank you for calling XYZ Bank. Press 1 to check your account balance. Press 2 if you are having trouble with a deposit…” and the list of options keeps going.
- I pressed 4 for more options, and was informed by the nice voice that my hold time would be 1 minute. I did get to speak to someone after about a minute, so kudos for at least getting that part right!
- I explained the reason for my call, and the woman said she would transfer me to the “claims department.” I said I didn’t want to make a claim – I just wanted to report the problem. No matter.
- I was put on hold again. When I finally got connected, another nice woman asked me for an account number. I told her I was not a customer, but the reason for my call was someone had vandalized their ATM and I was trying to help them by reporting it so they could take care of fixing it. She thanked me for calling, and then said she would need to transfer me to “someone in the right department.”
- Yikes! I politely declined to be transferred again, and bid goodbye.
Why was this so hard? Wouldn’t this be so much easier if they:
- Have the 800 numbers on the ATMS used exclusively to handle ATM issues.
- Have unique phone numbers assigned to geographic service areas.
- When a person calls, the system responds: “I see you are calling from the San Francisco bay area, and are having issues with one of our ATMs…” and then present a list of options relevant to the ATM experience.
The key point is this: The new world of customer engagement between banks and their customers has become the banking machine—it’s where most personal banking transactions are now done. And banks encourage this. Yet this bank, in particular, had made no accommodation for the different channels customers were now using to contact them.
Note to banks: Please be where your customers are, and tailor the engagement. With so many people going to ATMs rather than visiting the bank, shouldn’t every bank’s engagement model reflect this change?
Postscript:
A week after I took the picture above, I discovered that the ATM was out of service and has been for the last 5 days. Will I be civic-minded and call to let them know? Not likely!
At least they had scrubbed the green paint off.
