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Col 3 of 7

Economically vulnerable consumers

Part 2

By Bruce Cameron
Co-author to The Ultimate Guide to Retirement in South Africa

Bad treatment of economically vulnerable consumers by the financial sector

One of the major problems of the financial services industry is that it often puts it profits first, its intermediaries second and you are far at the end of the queue.

But then advertising saying “we are on your side’.

But the evidence is the way they market their products to you as a consumer. They often make it so difficult to use their services and then make it even harder to complain when issues go askew – and the economically vulnerable consumers are even more at risk.

Financial institutions decides how you should communicate with them – They give you little or no choice. Any consumer, including those with economic vulnerabilities, are often put off complaining because the system that make it difficult.

Everyone should be given a choice of how they want to make contact with a financial institution – not simply told it will be by telephone only.

Examples of bad treatment

Forcing people to use a telephone.

Many financial institutions, particularly banks, try to make you contact them by telephone. And they also contact you by telephone, which is a problem as you cannot be sure who is telephoning you. Problems include:

Many people are partially sighted or blind. The print on cellphones is small and they can struggle typing or reading messages;
many people do not have smart phones; or, if they have one they simply do not understand how to use them properly;
a customer has no record of what was said in the telephone call. This can be a problem when there is a complaint;
it makes it difficult for a vulnerable customer to consider an issue at a later date;
forgetfulness, and not necessarily dementia;
the impossibility of getting hold of the same person again and having to start the whole process yet again;
many people cannot afford to make repeated telephone calls, particularly when the customer seldom reaches the same person;
there are 11 official languages and one more if you add braille, with often only one or two languages being offered; and,
recent warnings from the Actuarial Society of South Africa about how artificial intelligence (AI) is going to increase risks for particularly old people as a result of cloning voices of children and grandchildren. This scamster use the cloned voices of offspring to demand money urgently.

No email address.

Increasingly many financial institutions do not provide email addresses to customers. They make the email address difficult to obtain and then cancel them as they are discovered and shared on social media. This has a number of consequences, including:

you battle to hear what you are told over the telephone if you are hard of hearing; or, you struggle to make yourself understood if you have a speech defect; and,
the institutions send you questions and then only provide a telephone number to reply.

Forcing people to use ‘Bots’ on a website.

Most ‘Bots’ only answer very basic questions, mainly by a process of elimination. This can start with a whole plethora of questions, made far worse when the institution provides such things as banking, health care, short- or long-term insurance or investments.

There are about two to three generations of older people who have little or no computer experience. Even signing a document online can present serious challenges. If challenged consumers are lucky, they have children or grandchildren they can trust to assist them;
after you have worked through all the various choices you do not get the answer particularly to a complicated question.
if the ‘Bot’ gives you a chance to interact with an individual in writing it can create a new series of problems. For examples may find the live ‘Bot’ representatives are poorly trained; and,
many people have no idea of what a ‘Bot’ is. Some even find it difficult to find their way around a website.

Making complaints systems difficult.

In most cases, as a complainant, you must first go to the company and lay your complaint (this on its own is often very difficult), then you need to go an internal complaints dispute mechanism within the financial services company. This is clearly out of line with treating you fairly. Some of the problems include:

there is little or no information about the complaint’s procedure; and,
some companies even refuse to give you the name and contact details of their own internal complaints person (This is required as a step before taking your complaint to one of the ombuds).

‘Locking’ requested documents.

Financial institutions often send out information which requires you to unlock the information using your identification or some other number. In most cases consumer requested information is often about something they have to declare to another institution, such as proof of a bank account. This ‘locking’ of documents is a bit of a con trick by financial institutions as they are worried that they will send information to the wrong person contravening the Protection of Personal Information Act. It is to protect themselves rather than you! If they are going to have these ‘locking’ procedures the financial institutions should find a programme that releases the ‘lock’ as soon as it is downloaded by a consumer.

Scams.

The financial institution telephones you but you have no idea whether it is really an institutional representative calling you. Often the telephone call is simply a scam trying to get your bank details. On top of this the Actuarial Society of South Africa recently revealed that artificial intelligence is being used to generate the voices of relatives who then ask you for money urgently!

Over the next few week this column will focus on a limited group of vulnerable consumers, namely those people who suffer from hearing, seeing and speech challenges, particularly the elderly.

There is a lot more detail on this in the book, The Ultimate Guide to Retirement in South Africa. For more information on how to purchase the book go to Buy Now on the website www.retirementplanning.co.za

https://retirementplanning.co.za/new-system-for-complaints-about-financial-institutions

https://retirementplanning.co.za/column-2-of-7-economically-vulnerable-consumers

https://retirementplanning.co.za/be-careful-about-how-you-invest-in-your-two-pots/

https://retirementplanning.co.za/col-13-name-and-check-your-beneficiaries/

https://retirementplanning.co.za/col-12-a-better-complaints-system/

https://retirementplanning.co.za/the-two-pot-saving-system-bruce-cameron/

https://retirementplanning.co.za/two-pot-system-should-low-income-earners-belong-bruce-cameron/

https://retirementplanning.co.za/column-11-your-future-and-the-two-pot-retirement-system/

Share this post

Col 3 of 7

Economically vulnerable consumers

Part 2

By Bruce Cameron Co-author to The Ultimate Guide to Retirement in South Africa

Bad treatment of economically vulnerable consumers by the financial sector

One of the major problems of the financial services industry is that it often puts it profits first, its intermediaries second and you are far at the end of the queue.

But then advertising saying “we are on your side’.

But the evidence is the way they market their products to you as a consumer. They often make it so difficult to use their services and then make it even harder to complain when issues go askew – and the economically vulnerable consumers are even more at risk.

Financial institutions decides how you should communicate with them – They give you little or no choice. Any consumer, including those with economic vulnerabilities, are often put off complaining because the system that make it difficult.

Everyone should be given a choice of how they want to make contact with a financial institution – not simply told it will be by telephone only.

Examples of bad treatment

Forcing people to use a telephone.

Many financial institutions, particularly banks, try to make you contact them by telephone. And they also contact you by telephone, which is a problem as you cannot be sure who is telephoning you. Problems include:

Many people are partially sighted or blind. The print on cellphones is small and they can struggle typing or reading messages;

many people do not have smart phones; or, if they have one they simply do not understand how to use them properly;

a customer has no record of what was said in the telephone call. This can be a problem when there is a complaint;

it makes it difficult for a vulnerable customer to consider an issue at a later date;

forgetfulness, and not necessarily dementia;

the impossibility of getting hold of the same person again and having to start the whole process yet again;

many people cannot afford to make repeated telephone calls, particularly when the customer seldom reaches the same person;

there are 11 official languages and one more if you add braille, with often only one or two languages being offered; and,

recent warnings from the Actuarial Society of South Africa about how artificial intelligence (AI) is going to increase risks for particularly old people as a result of cloning voices of children and grandchildren. This scamster use the cloned voices of offspring to demand money urgently.

No email address.

Increasingly many financial institutions do not provide email addresses to customers. They make the email address difficult to obtain and then cancel them as they are discovered and shared on social media. This has a number of consequences, including:

you battle to hear what you are told over the telephone if you are hard of hearing; or, you struggle to make yourself understood if you have a speech defect; and,

the institutions send you questions and then only provide a telephone number to reply.

Forcing people to use ‘Bots’ on a website.

Most ‘Bots’ only answer very basic questions, mainly by a process of elimination. This can start with a whole plethora of questions, made far worse when the institution provides such things as banking, health care, short- or long-term insurance or investments.

There are about two to three generations of older people who have little or no computer experience. Even signing a document online can present serious challenges. If challenged consumers are lucky, they have children or grandchildren they can trust to assist them;

after you have worked through all the various choices you do not get the answer particularly to a complicated question.

if the ‘Bot’ gives you a chance to interact with an individual in writing it can create a new series of problems. For examples may find the live ‘Bot’ representatives are poorly trained; and,

many people have no idea of what a ‘Bot’ is. Some even find it difficult to find their way around a website.

Making complaints systems difficult.

there is little or no information about the complaint’s procedure; and,

some companies even refuse to give you the name and contact details of their own internal complaints person (This is required as a step before taking your complaint to one of the ombuds).

‘Locking’ requested documents.

Scams.

Over the next few week this column will focus on a limited group of vulnerable consumers, namely those people who suffer from hearing, seeing and speech challenges, particularly the elderly.

There is a lot more detail on this in the book, The Ultimate Guide to Retirement in South Africa. For more information on how to purchase the book go to Buy Now on the website www.retirementplanning.co.za

Related topics:

By Bruce Cameron
Co-author to The Ultimate Guide to Retirement in South Africa