Banks have been upgrading technology day by day and delivering the products and services through various innovative channels like ATM, Internet banking, Mobile banking etc. But what the banks are forgetting is the personal touch that can develop long-term relationship with customers. Small banks can take the benefit of this because they cannot be compared with bigger banks in terms of implementation of technology. It is in the interest of bigger banks that they should use judicious mix of technology and personal touch for long-term viability.
When I was starting to leave my home, I recorded a reminder on my mobile; I wanted to deposit some money at a bank at 10 am. My husband, who works for a big corporate, has been holding an account with a private bank for nearly three years. During these years, we seldom did an "across-the-counter" transaction with the bank, for several reasons, of course. First, we maintain a cash balance, sufficient enough to take care of our commitments, second and most important reason being, there is no branch close to my house and if at all we happen to withdraw some money to meet any contingencies, we thought we need to go all the way to the branch to deposit money, which would turn out to be an expensive affair. So we were always on the safe side, by keeping a balance to honor our cheques. But this month, we had some very important payments to make and we rolled out some cash out of the bank account to meet the same. When the cheque date neared, we made arrangements to deposit the cash, and here I am on my way to the bank.
I entered the bank premises for the first time, I looked around...entrance with two scanners, high ceiling with a beautiful chandelier, meticulously done interiors, personalized single-window counters ... "Amazing", I thought. I was for a fraction of a second, comparing this ambience with that of my nationalized bank of 10 years, normal flooring-without carpets, fans-no centralized air conditioning system, papers scattered here and there. The only change I witnessed over the years was a few interior plants kept in select corners (most of them bore dust of several months), moulded chairs replacing the steel chairs and PCs, as the fruits of nationwide office-automation initiative. But for these nothing had changed, not even most of the staff! "What a difference" I thought, as I went on to fill up the form for depositing cash. I stood in the not-so-long queue, and was attended to in about two minutes. |
