Do you ask financial services customers for feedback?

One of the simplest ways to improve a product or a service is to gather direct feedback from the consumer. However, Maru/edr has recently revealed that over half of financial services customers currently feel that providers treat them unfairly.

Furthermore, financial services firms are failing to capture feedback from 17 million customers.

With the introduction of GDPR regulations, securing customer data to help influence marketing campaigns has now become a political minefield. It does raise the question: why are financial services companies not making use of feedback willingly provided by the consumer?

“There is clearly an appetite from customers to have their voices heard—the growth to review sites is testament to the expanding feedback culture we now live in.”

According to Maru/edr, of the respondents they spoke to, just 45% of them have been actively asked for feedback in the last 12 months.

Maru/edr reported: “The study tested key components of the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) Treating Customers Fairly (TCF) policy by questioning respondents about their perceptions and experiences of financial service providers.”

Although only 45% of consumers were asked for feedback, 84% of the 1,000 respondents to the Maru/edr survey revealed that they would be willing to provide feedback, if only given the chance.

The TCF initiative

The TCF initiative emphasises the need to consider consumer feedback when demonstrating how fair treatment has been adopted as a part of a business’s culture.

62% of the finance customers who took part in the survey said they were aware of this FCA fair treatment policy. Regardless of this, findings have illustrated that the UK’s financial services firms are failing to capture feedback from 17 million customers a year.

“Customer feedback is vital for brands looking to protect and grow their market share. Yet, for financial brands, customer feedback holds even more value in both improving services and demonstrating FCA compliance.”

Other notable findings from Maru/edr’s research are as follows:

• UK consumers rated the communication they have received from their financial services’ provider highly: 30%.
• The communication UK consumers have received has been relevant and personally appealed to them: 48%.
• UK consumers believe they currently receive a satisfactory amount of communication from their provider: 47%.
• Communication consumers have received from their providers has been clear: 70%.

These findings, although still somewhat disappointing statistics, do mark the beginnings of an effective shift in the industry.

Just three years ago, the FCA urged finance firms to stop using “excessively complicated language” when communicating with the customer.

Although this process is now well underway, more needs to be done to improve the overall statistics.

“Customer feedback is vital for brands looking to protect and grow their market share,” said Steve Brockway, chief research officer at Maru/edr. “Yet, for financial brands, customer feedback holds even more value in both improving services and demonstrating FCA compliance.

“There is clearly an appetite from customers to have their voices heard—the growth to review sites is testament to the expanding feedback culture we now live in.

He concluded: “But financial services brands are clearly currently missing a huge opportunity, leaving customers feeling unfairly treated.”