South African banks need a “culture change” in the way that they deal with customers, the Financial Services Board’s deputy executive officer of insurance Jonathan Dixon said at a press briefing this morning.
Dixon says the FSB’s Treating Customers Fairly (TFC) framework will provide a basis that will provide more protection to customers and says this framework seeks to bring about a culture change in the way banks treat customers.
Dixon says that there needs to be more intensive and intrusive scrutiny of banks by the FSB. Dixon says the FSB’s Treating Customers Fairly (TFC) framework will provide a basis that will provide more protection to customers and says this framework seeks to bring about a culture change in the way banks treat customers.
“It will be a long, uphill battle until the FSB can confidently say the standard of consumer protection is where we would like it to be,” Dixon told journalists attending the conference.
He says that the FSB intends to move from its current position of being reactive to being more pro-active.
“In other words, firms that continue to refuse to treat customers fairly need to feel a very strong disincentive for doing that,” he warned.
The framework seeks to also change the way that financial services providers deal with their customers. He conceded that companies will spend money to find loopholes within the framework but added that this will be a short-lived process because the FSB is determined to ensure that banks treat customers fairly.
There have been widespread complaints against banks for allegedly charging exorbitant fees and bank charges – compared with other countries around the world – and that the majority of South Africans remain “unbanked” because they cannot afford to open a bank account.
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