‘Personal warmth still exerts influence on someone choosing a bank’

In an industry driven by system-wide automation where all it takes is a few button clicks to consummate an online transaction, veteran banker Nilo Pacheco Jr. stands firm that the human touch still plays a crucial role in high-tech banking.

"Combined with convenience and timely financial products, that intangible feeling of personal warmth still exerts a major influence on someone choosing a bank to transact with," analyzes Pacheco, executive vice president and head of branches for International Exchange Bank (iBank), one of the biggest and fastest-growing commercial banks in the country.

Without a doubt, convergence technology has revolutionized the way financial transactions are carried. The pervasive use of the Internet and digital telephones now allow people to carry out virtually most of the common banking transaction without needing to be physically present or sending an authorized representative to the bank.

"The primary reason why we heavily invest in electronic facilities is because we know that our customers value their time and so must we. But that is not where the investment ends," Pacheco explains.

The bank invest just as heavily in customer service training for its personnel. The ultimate measure of a bank in the eyes of a customer is trust. The best way to cultivate a relationship of trust is through human interactions wherein the bank staff extends an unforgettable quality of customer service to their customers.

In the daily grind of banking, these human interactions can range from a simple phone call, to walk-in inquiries on deposit rates, to processing a loan application. This is why iBank has deliberately harnessed its strengths in human relations, coupled with responsive banking products in order to differentiate itself from the field of some 40 other local and international banks in the country.

This is also the reason why iBank has institutionalized both basic and continuing studies on customer service. Top executives are thoroughly trained in world-class service standards and continuously pursue courses on customer satisfaction benchmarks.

Last year, iBank sent three of its senior officers to attend the Disney Approach Business Program at the Disney Institute, Florida which showcased the powerful strategies and best practices applied by Disney on people management, quality service, loyalty, and creativity and innovation.

"The significance of customer service is first drilled into everyone through a 40-hour orientation course called ‘service mileage’. Our service standard is expressed clearly in our service strategy which says that the bank wants to please ‘the toughest customers’. This is the duty of everyone. And when we say everyone, we mean everyone starting from the president to the security guard who greets you at the doorstep," Pacheco points out.

"Everyone" includes support personnel such as the maintenance, messengerial, and security staff as well as the students who join the rigorous iBank summer internship program.

Last year, the bank pushed its service standards to an even higher notch when it instituted another 40-hour course called the Exceeding Customers Expectation Through Excellent Service Delivery (EXCEED) program which is an intensive follow-up on the Service Mileage program.

The program was designed to build upon the strong customer service foundation that has been laid during the basic training of the staff personnel. It aims to further strengthen its service culture by developing additional guidelines ensuring that customer wants and needs are handled at a uniformly excellent level by the staff.

"We believe that this complementary program is aptly named. After all, this is what we aspire for – to exceed the customer service expectations of customers. This is the holy grail of our institution and iBankers who best exemplify it are given the highest recognition,"explains Pacheco.