A new survey conducted by a British magazine, Moneywise, has voted Spanish bank
Santander (UK), the worst in customer service. Of the 12,000 people surveyed,
Santander (UK) recieved bad reviews from 40% of the respondents. Of the issues that customers had with the bank were long lines at branches, bad customer call service, and in general an unhelpful staff. Ouch.
While it should be noted that the survey was conducted in the UK for UK banks only, it highlights a bigger problem with growth through acquisition vs organic growth. Santander, whether it's in the US, or abroad, has grown it's assets through acquiring other banks. Whether it was Sovereign Bank, Abbey National, or Alliance and Leicester, the company has acquired too many other banks and has not focused on integrating the banks. While the bank has been able to grow, the company does not have a clearly defined integration technique or vision, and as a result, the service is lacking. Having staff that is not up to speed on how things works, how the banks products differ products or even how the systems work is a clear sign of bad management. Thus the poor customer service score. Sometimes acquisitions are great. Companies are able to diversify their offerings and products, but not focusing on the smaller details and the integration of the two companies is unacceptable and unfortunately is a byproduct of bad management and a lack of vision.
For more on the Moneywise report,
click here.
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Posted by GetHuman on Tue, 17 May 2011 2:28pm