New feudal lords are losing touch with customers

To paraphrase Jane Austen, it is a truth universally acknowledged that a large banking corporation in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a... good customer service. It was certainly seen to be the case this week when, on October 1st, Bank of Ireland introduced their new policy of ATM-only withdrawals. Prior to this, customers had the choice of taking money out via ATMs or by filling out paper forms in the bank and receiving their money over the counter.

It took one day for the public to register their protest via the Marian Finucane chatshow. A caller complained bitterly at the change in his long-established practice of counter withdrawal, a complaint endorsed by several callers. A spokeswoman for the bank came on to say that customers were being "encouraged" to use the new ATM-only system, whereupon Ms Finucane pointed out if there was no alternative, encouragement was the wrong word to use, and "forced" was the correct one.

The following day, another BoI spokesman, the head of group communications, Mr David Holden, qualified the new policy by stating it did not include customers from vulnerable areas of society, such as those who were disabled or elderly.

There was more than a whiff of damage-limitation speak about it. None of the other major banks - Allied Irish, National Irish or Ulster Bank - so far have this policy in place, but it can only be a matter of time before they follow.

The caller who contacted Marian Finucane was echoing the unhappiness that many members of the public feel at the consistently cavalier attitude of big banks to small customers. That unhappiness is not only about the current issue of removing a choice from customers over how they access their money; it spans many other issues. All the major banks appear to believe they know what is best for us and our money, from how we deposit it to how we access it. And my, do we pay for the privilege of handling our own money.

With BoI, it costs 22p every time you withdraw money from an ATM. Or you can pay £9 a quarter, for a maximum of 90 withdrawals. A bank draft costs £1.75. All the other transactions cost 22p each, such as lodging cheques. And yet, strangely, it takes three working days to clear a cheque lodged in your own branch and up to five working days if you lodge it in a different branch. Someone mention technology? We don't hear anything about the banks improving that particular customer service.

There cannot be anyone who has not been at the end of some foolish PR cock-up from a bank. This reporter, for instance, received a letter from BoI some weeks ago, asking to be considered when the time came to look for a mortgage. I wrote back to register amusement and alarm at the fact that my bank seemed to be so utterly unaware of my standing with them: I had already taken out a mortgage with them some months before. There was, of course, no reply to my letter.

When communication appears to be so poor between various internal departments, is it any wonder that banks seem to be totally out of touch with their general public customers? We can only assume they are more civil and attentive to the large corporate accounts they handle.

The bank, to which many of us are economically attached to in some form or other, whether through a mortgage, car loan, overdraft, or salary payment, has become the 21st century equivalent of the feudal lord to which we are forced to play the humble peasant.

One would think that banks should be even more careful with their PR and customer service than any other institution, since they are handling such a sensitive and important commodity - the public's hard-earned money.

Yet apparently the banks think we need them more than they need us, hence the consistent pattern of exiling the customer from personal counter service, since electronic banking clearly suits banks better as a more efficient way of doing business.

People like to have even a little illusion of control over how their money is managed. To be an ordinary BoI customer this week, and left with apparently no choice in how you access your own money, plus a notion that you are being ordered around to boot, it was unsurprising the metaphorical teeth were bared and people started calling radio shows.

"Negative publicity is always a little bit damaging, but I wouldn't overstate it," Mr Holden said this week.

Did he stop to consider that sometimes it is not the publicity that is negative, but the policy which that publicity is commenting and focusing on?