But it's our money!

Weapons bank customers can use to fight back

By: Krystyn Tully

Bank customers can fight back. Take it from me, a former victim.

  You've probably passed people like me on the street - teeth gritted, eyes wild, and mumbling about all the things "The Banks" have done, may have done, and still might do to me, you, and people we've never met.
  Now I've changed. I'm sassing back to tellers, managers, phone reps, and CEOs, saying all the things I could have, would have, and should have, but did not - mainly because I never really knew what I was talking about. I only knew that awkward foot-stomping, stomach-grumbling and there's-no-money-for-food helplessness that finally causes me to mumble something like, "... but, it's my money ... can't I just have it?" and then softer, "please?"
  Feeling helpless makes me grumpy (it really does), so I've been boning up on my banking legislation, policy, by-laws, and fine print. Now I know what to do and say, at least in theory, when the saucy teller says, "we are not obligated to tell you before we make changes to your account." I answer him smartly, "actually sir, according to the Bank Act, section 447(1), you shall not increase charges or add new charges to my personal deposit account unless disclosed in prescribed manner and at a prescribed time." When a branch manager says, "I'll never do this for you again," after releasing an unnecessary 2-week hold on a regular pay cheque, I would say, "Actually, miss, according to the Scotiabank customer-complaint resolution process, consulting the branch manager is step #1. If I continue to receive poor service, I will ask you to do this again." And I smile to myself.
 

For courtesy, promptness, and complaint-handling service, Canada's big banks rank in the bottom 5 of 21 industries

  Every bank is required, by law, to have a complaint handling service to help deal with these complaints (though some studies say as many as 40% of bank tellers do not know what theirs is), and the process varies little between them, all variations more or less on the Scotiabank system: Step 1, consult branch manager; step 2, contact the President's Office (this step has been relatively successful for me); step 3, contact the Scotiabank ombudsman.
  This last step, the ombudsman, is also required of every branch. I'm proud to say that my old bank, Scotiabank, has the worst customer satisfaction rate of all the banks, with 49% of the 175 cases resolved in 1999 ending in no agreement. (To put that in context, TD came next with 37.8%, followed by Bank of Montreal- 30%, Royal Bank- 29.5%, and CIBC- 29% of cases ending in no agreement.)
  If you simply cannot reach an agreement with your bank, there is still the Canadian Banking Ombudsman. Yet, of all the cases investigated and resolved in 1999, only 27% were decided in the customers' favour. (This Ombudsman, incidentally, is appointed by a Board of Directors, currently composed of 11 individuals, including the President of the Bank of Nova Scotia, the Deputy Chair of the Royal Bank, the Vice Chair of the Toronto Dominion Bank, the Vice Chair of Personal, Commercial, & Financial Services of the Bank of Montreal, and the President and CEO of the Laurentian Bank of Canada.)
 

If your bank officials don't listen to you, stop paying their salaries!

  Canada's major banks are doing a terrible job of servicing their clients, particularly individual depositors who comprise the vast majority of complaint-filers. According to a 1997 National Quality Institute survey examining courtesy, promptness, and complaint-handling service among other things, the big banks rank in the bottom 5 of 21 industries, in the company of such regulated monopolies as hydro, cable-TV, and Canada Post. By contrast, Credit Unions, ranked 3rd best.
  The difference? Banks, though they are often regarded as such, are not "businesses" in the classic sense - shareholder investment accounts for just 5% of their total capital base on average. The other 95% comes from deposits, yet it is the shareholders to whom your bank managers, Presidents, and Ombudspeople are accountable. At the Credit Unions, on the other hand, the customers are the shareholders, the ones who elect Board members, vote on by-laws, and influence policy. Maybe it's hyperbole, but this empowerment seems to work.
  Banks, while not regulated by members, are regulated by the federal Bank Act, meaning you can also push for fairer regulations through the political system. Just know what you're getting into: when changes to the Bank Act were being considered a few years ago, the Secretary of State for International Financial Institutions held 45 meetings, all with industry reps and none with consumer groups. What did you do to change this? (I know I did nothing).
  How we respond sets up how we will be treated. Large banks, not surprisingly, are more active in the political system than the average Canadian. They have more money certainly -- they donate between $500,000 and $1 m. each year to the federal governing party, and make the largest total donation of all industry sectors, but hey! It's OUR money that they're using! Close your account! Go somewhere else! Or become more active within the bank (one share = one vote).
  If your bank officials are not listening to you (just as I felt mine were not listening to me at Scotiabank), then you need to stop paying their salaries. As they get bigger and bigger, studies show the banks get less and less receptive to customer needs. The current trend towards "megamergers" in the face of very vocally unsatisfied customers, leaves me wondering if they even mind. Just 2 years ago, the President and CEO of TD Bank said, "I find it difficult to understand how a bigger bank will be more productive and offer better service to its clients." Welcome to the new millennium, where that same President and CEO proudly boasts that "the combined expertise of TD Bank and Canada Trust gives us a wonderful chance to build the better bank Canadians have been looking for..." Sorry, Mr. Baillie, but my better bank is a Credit Union.
  No matter how much (of our own) money is spent each year on TV ads to convince us our banks are great (about $15 m per bank right now), no matter how much rhetoric is spilled, it is all undone by the poor service we love to hate. In the end, there is one message the banks will always understand, the one they themselves taught to me and I mumble mantra-esque under my breath as I trudge down the street: the bottom line. But hey! Guess what? It's OUR MONEY!

Krystyn Tully is a freelance writer and co-founder of the Radioland Pictures production company in Toronto.

A good resource for those wanting to learn more about banks and banking policy is the Canadian Community Reinvestment Coalition, www.cancrc.org.

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