Changing banks - or not

[marsden_online]

Some recent research* indicates that people typically consider changing banks to be a much more difficult process than it really is.

*The title of this article is "Survey shows why customers change banks" - the article then focuses only on why they don't change banks. #fail NZ Herald.

"Interestingly, people's perceptions were that the financial cost of switching banks was high when in fact it is not, because the new bank often waives fees or contributes to legal costs to get new customers," she said.

People also had an "ingrained" perception that there was considerable hassle involved in changing banks.

Despite my ever-growing contempt for ANZ Bank's institutional incompetence I remain with them for two reasons

- I don't want to have to deal with the legal required to transfer the mortgage. Once more, when I close it off will be sufficient thank you. The end is on the horizon. Also being self-employed I probably won't be able to replicate the current nifty arrangement, made when I was on a reliable salary.

- I have an irrational and perverse attachment to my savings account number, which is an old Post Office Savings Bank number I've had most of my life (my parents opened the original account). There can't be that many of them left and I'm sure it grates on the ANZ systems to have to cope with it. For this reason I'm probably actually going to hold on this account for my EFTPOS/cash needs as long as I possibly can even after moving my heavy-duty banking elsewhere :->

The researcher actually suggests

Among her recommendations for banks to consider was the possibility of account number portability, as was now required for cellphone service providers.

I don't think this is a bad idea, just a bloody impractical one unless you're rebuilding the banking sector from the ground up. Ask anyone for Telecom/Vodaphone/et. al. who has had to deal with the integration of number-portability into those systems, and the chaos ensuing from not being able to tell if someone is your customer just by looking at their number.

Comments

[littlel.livejournal.com]

I left ANZ because they kspt messing around with my bank account. They changed one of my accounts without telling me just because they didn't want to have that as one of their account types anymore.

Also I had a postbank account (the only reason I ever ended up an ANZ customer) and they said it would be the same as it always was. Then they set about changing it, first its name (I think it became an access account) then the rules relating to it (it was supposed to work the same as a student account till I finished any schooling (they said your 18 now no more fee free account) In the end I was pretty much forced to close it.

[marsden-online.livejournal.com]

Yes, mine has been through those or similar changes with varying amounts of notification, and some are cause for my contempt of the system (the poor branch staff are generally as helpful as they can be IME but they don't make the decisions).

I've successfully challenged and reversed at least one of the changes - the most recent one they pulled, moving it to a flat-fee account which cost more than I was incurring in transaction fees on average.

But it still has the number!