As I've said in posts in the past, as a Gen Y-er, my main contact with my credit union is primarily online, and to a lesser extent via phone. I can accurately say I haven't been to a branch since February of 2010.
Because of this, the interactions that I have with my credit union are very meaningful - they are far and few between.
You know those automated robots that call you back if you've been on hold too long? Like, say for instance I called inquiring information about by account, stayed on hold for over 10 minutes and then was told I would receive a phone call back?
This is where the art of the follow through comes in.
I went through this earlier in the week, and guess what? I never received my phone call back.
You can say I'm ranting, or being too dramatic, but remember: this has been my third or fourth phone interaction with my credit union since about July. At worst, thats a 33% fail rate on their behalf.
Even worse, I was calling because I was having difficulty with their online banking system. That means I spent about 15 minutes before I even called being frustrated with them. All in all, I wasted about 45 minutes that I could have spent walking my imaginary dog, or taking care of my imaginary children.
The American Customer Satisfaction Index recently released its yearly rankings and credit union satisfaction was down 4 points than in the previous year. From the report:
Credit unions also scored an 80, but that was a “sharp decline” from a year earlier when that sector earned an 84, says Fornell. He attributes the dip to drastic cost-cutting measures credit unions have been forced into because of the need to preserve capital.
In this situation, the ball was dropped. It may have been a tech error, it may have been someone taking a too long lunch break, but the bottom line: my time was wasted. And this Gen Y-er (and I suspect many of you as well) does not appreciate it.
If you say you'll do something, do it. Follow through.
DeAndre