The Customer Respect Group, an international research and consulting firm that
focuses on how corporations treat their customers online, has released the results of its Summer 2004 Online Customer Respect Study of the largest U.S. financial services firms.
Overall, Bank of America scored highest among commercial banks, while Synovus Financial Corp. scored lowest. General Electric Company topped the diversified financials list, while Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. fared worst. Automatic Data Processing, Inc. was first among payroll services firms, while Ceridian Corporation was last. Golden West Financial Corporation led all savings institutions, while Westcorp came in last. And Franklin Resources, Inc. scored highest among securities firms, while Morgan Stanley scored lowest.
The study is the only one to bring objective measure to the analysis of corporate performance from an online customer’s perspective. It assigns a Customer Respect Index (CRI™) rating to each company on a scale of 0 to 10, with 10 being the highest achievable score. The Customer Respect Index is a qualitative and quantitative in-depth analysis and independent measure of a customer’s online experience when interacting with companies via the Internet.
By interviewing a representative sample of the adult Internet population, and by analyzing more than 1000 Web sites across a spectrum of industries in detail, The Customer Respect Group has determined the attributes that combine to create the entire online customer experience. These attributes have been grouped together and measured as indicators of Simplicity (ease of navigation), Responsiveness (quick and thorough responses to inquiries), Privacy (respects customer privacy),
Attitude (customer-focus of site), Transparency (open and honest policies) and Principles (values and respects customer data). Combined they measure a company’s overall Customer Respect.
The Customer Respect Group continually enhances its methodology by expanding the list of attributes researched and reported on. Recently, the firm expanded that list to include respect for individuals with disabilities. In addition, this research was conducted based on the financial services-specific methodology introduced this summer.
Summary
The Financial companies achieved a poor average of 4.9 in the Responsiveness index, which was the lowest scored area. The results were not helped by the nine companies that scored zero. This level of responsiveness is unacceptable and needs immediate attention. The best score was in Simplicity, which significantly impacts online users’ behavior. In fact, the Customer Respect Net Impact Study 2004 showed that 54 percent of users who had abandoned Web sites in the previous three months cited a lack of simplicity as the main reason why they did so, with 70 percent admitting that they would go to
a competitor if a Web site was difficult to use. If a Web site is not scoring well in Simplicity, it is losing potential customers. In other areas, the average score of 6.3 for Transparency is not very impressive, and shows that surveyed firms need to make more effort to explain their business and privacy policies fully and clearly. Of those firms with privacy policies, 78 percent said they share individuals’ data with affiliates, subsidiaries or business partners without permission from users. One firm, Ceridian , doesn’t offer a privacy policy. The Online Privacy Protection Act of 2003, which was
made law in California on July 1, 2004, has serious implications for any commercial Web sites without privacy policies that may have visitors from that state.
“We are heartened to see that some financial services firms have improved their sites since our last study,” said Roger Fairchild, president of The Customer Respect Group. “But too many still haven’t taken steps in areas such as privacy, responsiveness, etc. that are crucial to providing a satisfactory customer experience. Those firms that don’t consider the business impact of providing a poor Web experience are taking unnecessary, serious risks.”
The overall average for all firms was 6.4. Beyond these scores, the report conveys, in great detail, improvement opportunities for each company. The sector’s Summer 2004 rankings are as follows:
Top 20 Commercial Banks / CRI
1.Bank of America Corporation / 8.3
2.Wachovia Corp. / 7.7
3.Hibernia Corporation / 7.6
4.Wells Fargo & Co. / 7.6
5.SunTrust Banks, Inc. / 7.5
6.Comerica Incorporated / 7.5
7.KeyCorp / 7.5
8.Mellon Financial Corp. / 7.5
9.Huntington Bancshares, Inc. / 7.4
10.U.S. Bancorp / 7.4
11.Banknorth Group, Inc. / 7.4
12.FleetBoston Financial Corporation / 7.2
13.
14.Netbank, Inc. / 7.3
15.AmSouth Bancorporation / 7.2
16.SouthTrust Corporation / 7.1
17.M & T Bank Corporation / 7.0
18.Marshall & Ilsley Corporation / 7.0
19.Charter One Financial, Inc. / 6.9
20. Citigroup, Inc. / 6.8
Sector Average 6.6
Diversified Financials / CRI
General Electric Company / 7.1
Fannie Mae / 7.0
CIT Group, Inc. / 7.0
Countrywide Financial Corporation / 6.9
American Express Company / 6.8
Capital One Financial Corporation / 6.7
Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc. / 6.2
GATX Corporation / 6.0
Aon Corporation / 5.9
Moodys / 5.5
SLM Corporation / 5.3
Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. / 4.7
Sector Average 6.3
Payroll Services / CRI
Automatic Data Processing, Inc. / 6.6
Paychex Inc. / 6.0
Ceridian Corporation / 3.5
Sector Average 5.4
Savings Institutions / CRI
Golden West Financial Corporation / 7.4
Sovereign Bancorp, Inc. / 7.2
Washington Mutual, Inc. / 7.1
Greenpoint Financial Corp. / 5.3
Westcorp / 4.2
Sector Average 6.2
Securities Companies Table / CRI
Franklin Resources, Inc. / 7.0
A.G. Edwards, Inc. / 7.0
The Charles Schwab Corporation / 7.0
Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc. / 6.6
Raymond James Financial, Inc. / 6.4
E*Trade Group / 6.3
The Bear Stearns Companies, Inc. / 6.1
Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. / 5.8
Legg Mason, Inc. / 5.7
Lehman Brothers Holdings, Inc. / 4.6
Morgan Stanley / 4.5
Sector Average 6.1
Other overall findings for all surveyed financial services firms in the study include the following:
- Surveyed firms receive the best overall rating (CRI: 7.9) for Simplicity and the worst (CRI: 4.9) for Responsiveness.
- Some 13 percent of firms did not respond to any online inquiries.
- 15 percent of firms responded to half of the inquiries received. Of these, 90 percent responded within 24 hours.
- 72 percent responded to all inquiries. Of these, 78 percent responded within 24 hours.
- Some 31 percent of all sector firms use Autoresponder technology, in which emails are automatically sent to users to confirm the receipt of their inquiry and let them know when they should expect a response. Of these, 67 percent included detail on how quickly they would follow up and 71 percent followed up in the timeframe promised.
- Some 83 percent of companies provide email forms for online inquiries, 14 percent provide email addresses and three percent provided no online contacts.
- 99 percent of sector firms have privacy policies on their sites explaining how customers’ personal data is being used. Of those that do, three percent need to be more explicit about how they use personal data, 19 percent do not collect data or use collected data only for internal purposes, 19 percent share data with affiliates or subsidiaries and 59 percent share data with business partners without permission from users.
- Some 93 percent use cookie technology. Of these, 26 percent provide a full explanation about what advantage they provide the user and what data they hold, while 11 percent provide a full explanation on how to disable them.
- Six percent of companies provide forms that can be easily used by those with disabilities.
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