Thumbs up for SA banks

9 March 2005 - Smartnews

Cape Town - Though there is reason for concern at the number of complaints against banks, they are moving in the right direction, says banking ombudsman Neville Melville.

He told the Cape Town Press Club on Wednesday that in judging banks' performance, we had to look at the bigger picture.

He did not know how many "trillion" banking transactions were conducted every day, though the 14 000 queries a year to his office seemed a lot, he did not know what percentage of the actual errors that represented.

Those boiled down to about 3 000 "entrenched disputes" a year, of which just over were resolved in favour of the consumer.

Although the number was increasing, banks were also resolving more complaints because it was an embarrassment for them to have to go through the ombudsman process.

"But certainly they could be more careful. They shouldn't be making as many errors as many should come through to us.

"We do believe they should be sorting out more still, certainly compared to what is benchmarked overseas, for instance.

"There is area for concern, but we believe it's moving in the right direction."

Asked why people felt angry about banks in South Africa, he said he had done his research on the internet.

"I put in the words "hate bank" in Google and got three million responses, which was people hate banks because banks hate people," he said, laughing. "I don't want to add any comment to that."

Part of the problem was the high fees charged by banks, which in many sectors was seen as value for the services provided.

Another issue was that there was no strong consumer lobby in South Africa.

However banks collectively had now launched the Mzanzi account for low-income earners, which they did not make profit on.

"When pressures are brought to bear, changes happen. So I think everyone has a contribution as far as that's concerned."