The latest 2024 PwC Ghana banking survey report has revealed that Speed predictability of the end, employee knowledge/ expertise, easy access, and engaged employees emerged as the top five influential factors that differentiate customer experience (CX) for banking customers.
When customers visit their bank branches, they want to be in and out of there fast! Almost two-thirds (64%) of bank customers say short in-branch wait times contribute the most in making their banking experiences delightful. 60% of customers that took the survey want to spend ten minutes or less in a branch to complete their banking transaction.
Customers thrive on predictability, whether it has to do with process, equipment or results. Over a third (38%) of bank customers selected predictability as their second most prized factor in the excellent experience equation. Predictability in a person’s banking life—which essentially entails funds movement—affects many other parts of their overall life via the payment experience it affords.
Customers value knowledgeable employees, placing a premium on their interactions with them. In spite of the banking sector in Ghana being one of the leading industries in technology adoption, banking still involves a considerable number of interactions with real life persons at various touchpoints of banks, especially at branches and contact centres. And, when such interactions happen with an employee with insufficient knowledge, it leaves customers dissatisfied. 64% of customers noted that they appreciate employees with good product knowledge while 47% identified process knowledge as contributing positively to CX.
Further, the report also notes that bank customers consider availability, ease of access, responsiveness and promptitude desirable for excellent CX. No doubt, these attributes are key building blocks of excellent CX in any industry. The experiences that developments in the telecommunications, media and entertainment, and retail sectors have afforded consumers have made customers of banks to expect these as table stakes rather than CX differentiators. Customers expect that long after the bank has locked the doors to the branch, their bank (and their accounts) remain available to them when they need them.
WhatsApp towers over the heads of other common social media channels as customers’ preferred interaction platform. ~42% of bank customers selected WhatsApp as their preferred everyday communication and social media channel. A significantly smaller percentage of customers (11.2%) selected Facebook as their second choice for interaction. Youtube (8.1%), LinkedIn (7.7%), and Instagram (6.9%) then follow. Since bursting on the communications channels landscape 15 years ago, WhatsApp has gained prominence in most markets as one of the top three social network platforms.
Customers like to transact frequently; prefer the use of digital channels. Banking is considerably enmeshed in the daily lives of bank customers, most of which involves very simple transactions. The simplicity of these transactions underscores the value of speed and easy access to customers, and further explains the importance of well-functioning digital channels. More than half of survey respondents (53%) say they prefer to conduct their banking on digital channels, using their phones, laptops and tablets. Furthermore, bank customers that took the survey seem to suggest that, in the main, bank mobile apps are the preferred digital channels (64%) well ahead of USSD (16%) and web/ Internet (16%).
According to PwC Ghana their decision to undertake the 2024 banking survey report was necessitated by the fact that during its routine interactions with the industry that banks constantly demonstrate curiosity about how well they are performing in the delivery of delightful and memorable customer experience (CX) at their various touchpoints. “In many instances, the interest of banks narrowed to how their performance
compares with their peers and the industry. Our decision to focus on banking customer experience (“banking
CX”) in our 2024 Ghana Banking Survey was, therefore, in part to satisfy this curiosity of the industry.
Beyond that, however, this decision was founded on our long-held belief that – for any industry or business –
there is a much closer-than-obvious relationship between CX and financial performance.”the report explained.
The report reflects the views of the Ghana Association of Banks, which reports an achievement of an overall Profit margin of 37% (before taxation) marking a strong recovery from the previous year’s loss due mainly to the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP). This was not the only refreshing news “the industry showed strong performance in key indicators such as asset quality, capital adequacy ratio (CAR), return on equity (ROE), liquidity, nonperforming loans (NPLs) and sensitivity to market risk as well as a remarkable improvement in ROE” according to the CEO of the Ghana Association of Banks. The survey topic on CX explores the needs of customers—customers who have stayed with these banks through the DDEP and now.
The banking survey sheds light on the critical role of customer experience (CX) in the banking industry. As the backbone of financial services, banks must prioritize CX to retain existing customers and attract new ones, the report captured.
By Eugene Davis
