Comments on: People Experience: The Bank

By: iBjorn » Blog Archive » 5 Things You Should Know

iBjorn » Blog Archive » 5 Things You Should Know — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 10:08:41 +0000

[...] The People Experience Series (about interactions with products and services) @ The Bank, Apple, Coffee [...]

By: Brad

Brad — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 14:38:12 +0000

Our local credit union does a pretty fair job, but there is always room for improvement. Part of the problem with it is that it is local, but that is really my problem – I just have to plan ahead when I am out of the area.

It strikes me odd that their staff has a lunch hour at the same time most other folks are on their lunch hour and trying to get some business done. So, instead of staffing from 11AM – 1PM, they are short-staffed and folks wind up spending half their ‘hour’ getting a check cashed (while some genius in front of the (only) line wants to either turn in 40 pounds of change, tries to balance his checkbook, or is buying 7 money orders because he won’t use paypal – or is flirting with the teller).

How tough would it be to pull someone off the back office to keep another window (or two) open for this 2 hour busy time of the day? These people used to work as teller before they moved to the other office.

The bank in New York area you are referring to is probably Commerce Bank (ticker: CBH).

Later hours would be fine, if only for drive-up service. However, I would like the lobby to be open as well.

By: Shivani

Shivani — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 06:27:33 +0000

banks suck, I agree. I think staying open late and on weekends is a good idea, I think I would actually switch to a bank that stayed open late and on weekends. (btw, Wells Fargo in San Jose is now open till 6 pm on Saturdays)

But, as far as the other things, like pens at the ATM’s, are concerned, it’s one of those things that doesn’t really add that much value. Pens get stolen, they cost money, and I’m sure you would be a more pissed off customer if you had come to the ATM expecting a pen and not having one instead of not expecting one at all.

I think most people forget that banks are still trying to run a business and the only way for them to make money is to either make some drastic change to the standard business model of a bank (like what southwest or jet blue did for airlines) or only provide services that they can get a return on, like lending to low risk business ventures.

the create a community is a great idea. all the parents I know love to go to WAMU because most of the wamus have a play area for kids to keep busy.

By: Nick Gavronsky

Nick Gavronsky — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 01:24:43 +0000

I definitely think banks should be open longer and should offer more personalized services that actually make customers feel like they are getting all the attention. For starters, they really should try and cut down on the lines and the time it takes to get to a teller. I waited in like for 15 minutes a few weeks ago at BOA just to get a money order processed.

By: Rick

Rick — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 00:30:15 +0000

I bank at Bank of America, but I could just as easily bank at Chase or any of the other biggies. I prefer the biggies because I want to be a customer whatever state I’m in. How hard would it be for the branch manager to have coffee and doughnuts in the conference room for business customers who were interested in meeting other business customers on a periodic basis? How about wine and cheese on a Tuesday evening once a month, a quarter, or how about just once to see if there was any interest? When I go into the local branch, I see many people that I don’t know that are obviously working people. Would they like to side my house, re-roof my house, landscape my house, mow my lawn? How am I supposed to know, stand with a picket in front of the bank? Come on Bank of America (or somebody), wake up. You do #5 right and the rest won’t matter.

By: Nick

Nick — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 22:08:19 +0000

I completely agree with being open later then 6:00. In fact, I wrote an entire post on it. If you're so inclined, you can click through and find out what I had to say. Boo to banks!

By: Brian Breslin

Brian Breslin — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 20:48:42 +0000

Noah,
Banks here in Miami are now open till midnight in some cases, and 7 days a week.
(BankAtlantic.com) The pen idea is good, so would OCR built into the deposit thing, then no more envelopes would be necessary.

By: BankHater

BankHater — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 19:41:05 +0000

Back in my college broke ass years, I wrote a check for $2.50 to buy a pack of cigarettes. Little did I know, my landlord cashed a check that I gave him 5 months prior…needless to say….the stupid bank honored his check and overdrew on my account but decided to bounce my $2.50 check to the gas station. Gas station automatically sends bounced checks to a collection agency….the result was that I had to pay a $80 fine for the freaking $2.50 check.

I yelled at the bank saying why did they allow the landlord’s check when there was insufficient amount but decided to reject a $2.50 check. If they had bounced my landlord’s check, he would have come to me for the money……but as for the gas station, they automatically sent it to a collection agency, which i was forced to pay a fine.

I closed my account with that bank…..they probably thought….we dont need this poor student’s account anyhow….well the moral of the story….7 years later, I have over $200K in my bank account. So fuck you little shitty bank.

By: Paul McEnany

Paul McEnany — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 18:55:53 +0000

How about this – If I’m about to seriously fuck up my account, fucking tell me about it.

oh, and fuck Wells Fargo with a very large stick.

By: Cameron

Cameron — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 18:46:50 +0000

It’s amazing how often some of the best ‘people’ experience fixes are so simple – if these decision makers would just use a little common sense sometimes the world would be a lot more usable.