GTBANK Plc
635 Akin Adesola,
Victoria Island,
Lagos
Attention: Management
Dear Sir,
GT Disconnect: Continuous Service Failure at GTBank
Last year, I was an angry customer, today I am no longer angry, just amazed
how ignorant a bank that claims to be customer centric can be when it acts so
distant and disconnected from its customers. As I no longer consider myself a
customer, I have also managed to convince myself that despite all the
razzmatazz GTBank knows nothing about Customer Service.
As far as I am concerned right now, GTBank is the worst bank in Nigeria.
Yes, this is my opinion and if you have walked my walk with GTBank you will
agree with me. For this reason, I must narrate my nightmare of a journey as a
former Customer of GTBank. As I write this letter, my only motivation is that
it may be a source of feedback and reform for the bank. I have an innate belief
that when we don't offer feedback we deny the affected party the opportunity to
learn and develop and in this case change from its ignorant ways.
My letter is long, because it is a story depicting the history of a
dysfunctional relationship between a corporate entity and its customer. For
whatever it's worth, let's learn what we can about service failure over
multiple channels.
My grievances with GTB have been long piling but I will begin with the
straw that broke the camel's back.
Sometime in December 2012, I made an online dollar based transfer from our
corporate account to a client account. The first transfer was unsuccessful and
so I tried again immediately. As soon as I did, I received a debit alert for 2
transactions, indicating that I was debited twice for the same transaction. I
had been told on a previous occasion that internet banking issues were dealt
with via GTConnect, GTBank’s telephone banking service and so I called
GTConnect to narrate the experience of multiple debits for one transaction.
As I was more interested in getting the debited money reversed, I explained
that this was not the first time I had experienced such a problem with GTBank
and multiple debits, it had happened with Bill Payments, Airline Bookings and
in fact it had happened a few months before where I was debited twice for a
bank transfer even though I received an error message that there was a transaction
processing error. I explained that the previous time I called GTConnect and the
transaction was reversed. He responded that on this occasion, he couldn't do
anything about it because it was a GTBank to GTBank transfer, hence the
transfer of funds were instant. When I asked how the issue could be resolved, I
was told that if I knew the person who the money was transferred to I should
ask them to transfer the money back to our account. When I asked about what
would happen to all the bank charges incurred as a result, I was asked to send
an email to complaints@gtbank.com
which I did. The next day I received a response by email saying that all
internet banking related complaints were handled by GTConnect so I called them
again.
The second time I called GTConnect the response from the lady I spoke to
was that I should not process transactions twice without checking my balance. I
was alarmed that she was insisting that despite seeing an error that the
transaction was unsuccessful, I was to blame for the incident seeing that I
didn’t confirm whether GTBank’s processing error was a false report. In other
words she was insinuating that I should not have believed the bank’s error
message. I thought her explanation was absurd!
At this time, I asked what would happen to all the bank charges incurred as
I had been charged $43 for both debits and asking that the money to be
transferred back would mean another $43 will be debited to the client account,
making a total transaction charge of about $130 for one transaction. I was told
that we would have to bear the cost of all transactions. By this time, I could
not believe that GTBank would make a decision that puts its customer in such a
discontented state.
I informed her that if this was their decision, I would close that account
as I couldn't understand how GTBank would expect us to bear the cost of a
system error. So I asked that the matter be escalated, which she agreed to do.
A few days later she called to inform me that a decision had been made by her
superiors and that no refund could be made to our account. She claimed that the
system showed that I had initiated the transaction twice myself. I didn't know
what to make of her explanation. What do you do when there is an error processing
a transaction? Look at you screen? Of course you will naturally try again. I
had asked her whether she made it clear how angry I was and how I was prepared
to close the account if nothing was done in terms of a refund, she acknowledged
in the affirmative. At that point, I saw the writing on the wall, it could not
have been clearer; 'WE DO NOT NEED YOUR BUSINESS'. After 4 years of banking
with GTBank, they were happy to part ways with us over $90.
For the first time in a long time, I felt bullied and disregarded. I was
angry and I felt cheated. Was GTBank bullying us? Or was GTBank trying to rip
us off our hard earned money? On what basis, given all the information GTBank
had about this transaction did GTBank feel that it was ok to charge us 3 times for
a system error. Even if I as a customer had made a genuine mistake does it make
it alright for GTBank to go ahead and take advantage of the situation. Surely
the image I had of GTBank at that point was that a smirk faced gangster who
went around bullying people and reaping where they did not sow. What does
GTBank stand for? Where are your values? More so, what values were being
depicted by your response?
I know that our account portfolio is too small for GTBank, it has appeared
on several occasions that we were being looked down on, in fact over the last 3
years we got so tired of being ignored that we began winding down our dealings
with your bank, limiting our transactions to domiciliary and a few clients who
want to make online transfers to our GT account.
In the 4 years of banking with you, GTBank does not even know our online
address let alone our physical address. In these days of ‘Know Your Customer’
GTBank representatives have never ever been to our office or reached out to us.
GTBank does not even know what business we are into. They do not even know that
we know longer operate from the location that we registered as our initial
address. When we moved to our Lekki office, our Zenith Bank account officer was
there, in fact, sometimes she comes to say hello when she is in the area and
sometimes I am too busy to even see her. Diamond Bank has followed us to every
single office address even up till a temporary address we had for 6 months.
GTBank, to say you do not know us is an understatement.
But it is obvious why GTBank knows little about us, it is because they just
do not care! To GTBank we are nothing more than a transaction; we are simply
processed like items on a production line or checkout counter. NEXT! Why bank
with GTBank when there are so many other banks offering the same and even
better services? What is the benefit of banking with GTBank? You do not want
nor need our business and neither do we need you. One phone call to Zenith or
Diamond bank, they will be very glad to assist in helping us clear the last of
our measly funds in your bank.
What services has GTBank ever offered to us? Instead you look for ways to
belittle us the more. A few days ago for the second time, you sent your
condescending email on SME Banking. What are you offering SMEs? You had nothing
else to say but were pleased to inform us that we no longer had the elusive
account officers; instead you were lumping us SMEs all together and assigning
us 2 account officers. Whoopee! Is that service? Letting us know that we are
now a group of who knows how many and not worthy of personalised or even
customer centric solutions. Whatever your plans for SMEs are, you sure have a
very poor way of communicating it.
Like we didn't know we were small till you labelled us. Shout it out loud,
let everyone hear that we now have 2 people looking after all of us, yet these
same 2 people have never reached out to us or offered us anything to support or
grow our business. Instead they charge us uncompetitive and exorbitant rates
while seeking gangster laden opportunities to rip us off. What are you doing
for small businesses? How are you partnering and supporting our development?
Sorry to bust your bubble but Arts and Culture are not our priority, survival
and growth are. Customers are tired of your product centric approach.
What is GTBank doing about SMEs? Have you reached out to the small
businesses that support GTBank or are you going outside to do your Charity and
CSR. We have been with you for 4 years, no one ever reached out to us. A gentle
reminder that ‘Charity begins at home’. Have you for a split second reached out
to 'we' labelled as SMEs and thought of ways to support us, beyond account
officers that have no experience or zeal to deal with our issues. We need
empowerment, education and favourable financial services.
Let me remind you that Small businesses are powering this economy in ways
that big businesses can only dream of. Small businesses are an economic source
to many households, employing youth and bridging commercial gaps while dealing
with the dearth that exists in our society. What is GTBank's role in all this;
Nothing! I can say this authoritatively because we have banked with you for 4
years and have never ever been offered any service of real value. It is not
like what ‘we’ SMEs think matters, but it is not enough to be known for funding
and supporting big businesses, if you are genuinely interested in supporting
causes, I have a 1001 ideas and issues to present you with.
GTBank, your people couldn't care less about us and they showed it
AUDACIOUSLY and continue to show it at every opportunity. Our issues were
escalated and someone at a higher level said ' LET THEM GO, WE DON'T NEED
THEM'. My dear, a wise business person knows that no business is too small,
even if all you got from us was $200 a month, that can pay 1 teller's salary.
By the way, your $200 ‘chicken change' is staff salary to some of us.
I won't even go into my personal account issues with GTBank. The list will
go on and on. In my naïve days when I thought I could rely on having one bank
card, it was stories of woe. Is it the number of times I have been stranded at
airports because there is never money in GTBank ATMs? On one occasion I was
saved by left over holiday dollars I had in my wallet, all because GTBank failed
at the ATM, then failed at the Airport in Lagos, then failed at the POS at the
hotel. Can I count how many times I have felt like a fraud trying to convince
the cashier/proprietor that I have money but my GTBank card is not working? Or
is the day that I drove across Lagos to collect money from a friend because
GTBank ATMs all over Lagos were out of service? Or is it the day I was
embarrassed at the checkout overseas because GTBank unknown to me will not
allow me spend over $1000 a day when overseas; how am I supposed to buy a
laptop??? You said you no longer give foreign exchange, that I should use my
Naira MasterCard when I travel and yet when I try to use the card I cannot buy
what I need.
GTBank fails over and over again, over multiple channels; Banking halls,
ATM, POS, Online payment, International travel; the service failure is
continuous. Relying on a GTBank card is like playing the lottery, your
probability of winning is very slim. Where GTBank fails, Zenith Bank comes to
the rescue. I cannot count the number of times my Zenith Bank card has saved me
from the embarrassment of GTBank.
You may say to yourself that you are good but that will not be true. That
mediocrity is highly accepted in our country does not mean that when you see
poor service you classify it as good. You may even consider yourself better
than some of your competitors but be rest assured that it is simply a case of
'in the land of the blind, a one eyed man is king'. GTBank you have a loooong
way to go!
So what can you do really? Because if you still don't know what to do to
resolve your issues, you are still at square 1, simply going round in circles
like a sick chicken or worse still you are on a treadmill, working hard and
running fast but still on the same spot.
Whatever the case, GTBank get to know who your customers are, not just big
ones, small ones too. Stop using our basic bio data to offer mediocre services.
We are no longer impressed that you know our names and our birthdays, that is
so passé. Use data as a business intelligence tool. Using analytics, seek areas
where you can truly add value to customers. Use data to identify trends,
predict customer current and future needs, and stop doing old-school surveys.
The devil is in the detail; look through the data. If you saw the data, will
you even be able to analyse and interpret it for business use? If not, then go
and learn how to. Find out how the rest of the world is using data to drive
business.
GTBank, be customer centric, not product and system centric. Do not allow
Systems be a source of grievance to your customers. It is not enough to have
COT charges on auto pilot if you cannot reverse them. That the system showed I
initiated a transaction several times is just the beginning of the story not
the end. Find methods to capture other parts of the scenario and help your
staff make better decisions when faced with customer issues. Should customers
be punished because your systems are programmed a certain way? Systems do not
work well enough on their own; if they did technology would have taken over
everything. The human element still has an important role to play…but even when
I tried to draw GTBank’s attention to the human issues, GTBank still took the
system’s side over the customer, debiting us of $130 instead of $43.
When I called GTConnect, I called to speak to a human being not a robot. I
truly believed that if I explained the circumstances of the transaction, a
human being would understand but the response from the human being was even
more robotic. The human beings disregarded the information I provided and set
out to impose punitive measures instead. A customer centric solution would have
focussed on customer satisfaction and retention not customer humiliation. I
really felt disappointed, cheated and disregarded a mix of emotions that should
never have been allowed to happen.
GTConnect is just a 1st level call centre. It is a waste of money with no
ROI if the people there cannot resolve customer issues or use analytics to
develop customer centric solutions and customer loyalty. Training them on
customer service is not enough. That they should be polite is expected but that
is not where Customer Service ends. The real question is can they deliver
customer value? If they cannot solve my problem, they are useless to me, no
matter how polite they may be. If they are too junior in rank that they have no
delegated levels of authority then they cannot deliver value to customers who
need certain issues addressed and resolved. If they don’t use business
intelligence to help make informed decisions to indemnify irate and
dissatisfied customers then close GTConnect only reopening it when they can
deliver true customer value.
Last week, I received a phone alert that my expired GTBank debit card was
ready for pick up. I called the account officer to ask how I could get my new
card seeing that I had no plans of going into the busy halls of Awolowo way
branch. As I had no relationship with this individual whom was once
communicated to me to be my account officer, I knew I stood no chance if I asked
if my card could be delivered to me but I still went ahead and asked and of
course to no surprise the answer was NO. From the tone of the conversation, it
was obvious she didn't know who I was (I AM A NOBODY AFTERALL), she didn't have
my number yet I had stored her details after all the years that the account had
been opened. That sure made me feel great, another one up for GTBank!
A bit baffled why she was so disconnected, I felt compelled to ask her if
she was still with GTBank and she confirmed that she still was so I went on to
make my enquiry on transferring my card to a closer branch. I was promptly told
that only GTConnect could arrange the transfer of my card to another branch.
Before I could say anything else she had hung up. Of course I have no energy
right now to speak with GT DISCONNECT. I guess I should have also inquired if
they had also moved my personal account to SMPA (Small and Medium sized
Personal Accounts) seeing that I do not have much money there either. But why
would I have any money in a bank where I have no relationship?
On the flip side, last month my Zenith account officer brought my Zenith
debit card to my office and when she arrived she came with a letter stating
that Zenith Bank had reduced our COT charges by half. With Diamond Bank the
concessions offered to us were immediate on opening the account; as a result we
quickly discontinued some of the transactions we did with GTBank. With GTBank,
the story is very different; hmmm do they even know who we are? Nope! When I
did ask for a concession all I got was a blatant NO! I read between the lines
and figured that the account officer didn’t have the authority to offer us a
concession, and then my question is why are we assigned an account officer who
cannot offer us any value-adding services? Again I got the impression that the
unimportant accounts were handled by inexperienced people who have nothing to
offer us in terms of service.
Why will concessions be reserved for the big firms when it is an obvious
and clear need for small firms? Must we even have to ask for a concession;
can’t you just predict our needs and give it us as evidence of your support?
Why are you offering services to big firms and creating crippling conditions
for small firms? Again I ask, what values are being depicted here?
GTBank, proffer solutions for your market segments, big as well as small.
The Nigerian market remains untapped; so many problems are evidence of all the
opportunities that exist within. GTBank, THINK!
Right now I have no ties with GTBank, no meaningful relationship with any
of the so-called account officers who opened all our accounts. 4 years later
and I cannot make a business case for staying with your bank. After opening an
account with GTBank, it ended there, I know no one there that cares about
whether we are still in business or are gone tomorrow. I have never been
offered any services; the bank appears to be satisfied with just collecting COT
charges.
I know we don’t have money and by the time you look at our account balance
you’ll probably laugh and say upon all this long talk, no money. My dear, empty
barrels they say make the most noise. There is power in communication; at least
maybe when someone reads or hears about our experience they can decide on what
to make of GTBank but this is my story.
We are going where they will appreciate us. GTBank, it was NOT NICE doing
business with you.
Regards,
Adora
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