Overall satisfaction levels among bank customers fell to 79.3 per cent in February – down from 79.6 per cent in January, showing the first monthly decline since March 2011, according to the latest report from Roy Morgan Research.
The ‘Customer Satisfaction – Consumer Banking in Australia Monthly Report’ stated that the results were spurred on by "out-of-cycle" mortgage rises in February following the Reserve Bank of Australia’s decision to keep the cash rate unchanged.
ANZ – which was the first major institution to increase their home loan rates last month – copped the brunt of the negative publicity fallout and subsequently showed the largest drop in satisfaction among home loan customers of the four major banks, the report revealed.
Roy Morgan stated that Westpac – who were the next to announce a rate rise – also showed a drop in the satisfaction levels of their home loan customers.
The largest overall decrease in satisfaction among the major four institutions went to the National Australia Bank (NAB) (-0.8 percentage points) which was due mainly to a decline in satisfaction among their non home loan customers, the research house stated.
According to the report, "over the last 12 months NAB has been the biggest improver among the big four (+6.5 percentage points) and currently leads with 78.7 per cent customer satisfaction, followed by the ANZ on 77.9 per cent (an increase of only 2.8 per cent over the period)".
Taking third position in overall satisfaction, Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) posted an increase of 4.8 per cent over the year to 77.3 per cent and showed the biggest increase in home loan customer satisfaction among the major four banks over the past 12 months (up 9.2 percentage points), the report stated.
As Roy Morgan’s previous report revealed, the smaller banks still lead the major institutions with Heritage Bank scoring a 91.9 per cent rating, followed by ING Direct on 90 per cent and Bendigo Bank on 89.8 per cent.
The survey also revealed that the satisfaction levels of business customers of all major banks scored 66.3 per cent in February 2012 compared to 79.3 per cent for personal customers.
The big disparity between the two consumer segments is "likely to attract increasing attention by banks as customers are likely to feel more predisposed to switching banks if they feel they are not getting a good deal".
