ON CUSTOMER SERVICE || The Perils of Having an Oligopoly in the Canadian Banking Industry
I always feel like I need to do an hour of yoga to calm myself after a customer service call to the bank.
Anyone else?
Banks. You really wish you never have to deal with these institutions because once you have to engage, you discover how inefficient and disconnected the processes are when resolving issues.
Case in point. I noticed a fraudulent transaction on our credit card last week and immediately called it in. I was reassured that:
The card would arrive in two days at the branch on Saturday. I reminded the customer service personnel that I needed the business card as I expected several automated advertising transactions to go through over the long weekend. They reassured me that the fastest way would be to send it to a branch and that it would arrive Saturday and not on Tuesday after the long weekend.
I also requested that they notify me with a text when the card is ready for pickup; given the number of scam calls nowadays, I don’t pick up any numbers I don’t know.
Fast forward to Saturday morning. I hadn’t heard anything from the bank yet and didn’t receive a text. Banks close at 4PM on Saturday here, so I decided to call in around 11AM to check on the card's status.
A lovely representative who knew nothing about my previous conversation with her colleague picked up and checked in on the status of the new card and let me know that it would likely arrive Tuesday because of the long weekend.
If you’ve been in a situation where you know your efforts would be wasted but still pursued the matter, that was me, fruitlessly explaining to the customer representative what her colleague had promised me.
She advised that I shouldn’t visit the branch today because the card likely won’t be there until Tuesday. I could also call the branch to check if the card has arrived. I then inquired whether she saw a note to contact me for card pickup via text message, and she said that’s at the branch level, for the branch service personnel to decide how they want to reach out. So, either I called the wrong customer service portal, or I did reach the right service portal and was promised things that were “impossible” within the TD Canada Trust banking structure (expedited credit card delivery, a specified contact method).
After thanking the representative for their help and saying I understood how it was out of their control (after all, they could only follow a script and protocol), I called my branch.
Surprise. After listening to the robot voice direct me to press through several steps, it took me back to the general credit card line. I tried again. This time, I clicked the key described as “…if you wish to speak to a customer representative at the branch…” and was told that my message is very important and I should leave a detailed voice message so they can get back to me (as soon as it was convenient for them).
For an institution that impacts consumers’ day-to-day, why are we stuck with subpar service?
I’ve always admired how institutions imagine business service interruptions as regular things. Who needs an up-time of 100% anyway? Your business can handle a full week of being unable to pay vendors, client digital ads, and other pertinent business expenses. It’s just 7 out of 28 days in the month, just 25% of your operating time that we’ve turned into downtime.
Why do online service personnel have no control over or communicate with in-branch personnel? Isn’t the goal to ensure a seamless online-offline customer service experience?
The majority of my banking has been with TD for the past decade, but thanks to the accumulation of these inconvenient scenarios, I’ve moved over 70% of my business to RBC. Not that the customer service is any better at any other big bank, but at least I don’t have all my eggs in one basket.
With an oligopoly in the banking industry, consumers have been left to save themselves and suffer such customer service scenarios when they encounter unpleasant surprises: losing a credit card, fraudulent transactions, and more. The bank’s customer service response is, we’ll deal with you at our convenience, and you can sit at home and fret about something that concerns your livelihood.
This isn’t an issue I’ve experienced with just one bank. My interactions with other banking personnel have been similarly anxiety-inducing. Does anyone bank with HSBC? RBC? Or [insert other big bank name]? I’ve had emails go unanswered for weeks with my Business Account Manager, and when I finally got them on the phone, they said they didn’t respond because that’s not something within their area, and they can’t access those details. How nice would it be if they saved my time to send follow-up emails and call them if they just told me that after seeing my first email?
Consumers are stomaching a high level of laziness and incompetence from personnel like this hiding within the folds of a large corporate. If businesses are complaining about the fickleness of customers switching banks all the time, I think they should first do some work on themselves
