bunq's customer contact strategy: no possibility to quickly get a bunq employee on the phone in the event of bank fraud or suspicion thereof. In addition to the 'SOS Hotline', which led to an answering machine, live chat was offered as the main contact channel. Ziptone asked the Customer Service Federation for comment on the bunq file.

First of all: does bunq's chosen customer contact strategy (no direct telephone accessibility) fit within the service promises of the KSF?
“bunq has a clear customer contact strategy for both regular customer contact and customer contact in emergencies. There is nothing wrong with that and with that strategy, customers should be able to reach bunq easily, both from the app and when they no longer have access to it," said the KSF through its director. Roel Masselink. “In that sense, we do not see bunq's primary channel strategy as directly in conflict with ours service promises. However, your strategy may not or may no longer be sufficient in concrete situations. As an organization you must be constantly alert to this and bunq has also indicated that it has underestimated things. In addition, in our opinion, as the potential impact of a crisis or incident for the customer increases, you can also expect an organization to be more alert.”

No regulations necessary

The KSF does not believe that there should be or will be legal rules when it comes to the design of customer contact for crisis situations, nor does the KSF feel in favor of a legal accessibility criterion. “That's not a real solution; 'one size fits all' is rarely the case in customer contact,” said the KSF in response to questions from Ziptone. Legal minimum requirements also raise a lot of other questions, says the KSF: which organizations will it apply to and which will not? What will be the minimum requirement? What is the penalty if you do not comply? And how are you going to enforce it?

Customer contact strategy must fit in well

The KSF does state that organizations that market their products and/or services for a specific customer segment should tailor their customer service strategy accordingly. This contributes to the success of organizations. “It is therefore essentially fine that customer service for a certain product service can only be reached via an app or chat,” says the KSF, which, however, also says that crisis/incident management must be part of every customer service strategy and the strategy aimed at business continuity . “Tackling a crisis or incident may require a different channel strategy than 'regular customer service',” says the KSF. The KSF can imagine that some products/services entail an additional duty of care towards the customer. This includes government services, financial services and healthcare.

“We believe that it is much more effective to actively encourage organizations to permanently think about their customer contact strategy and improve it and to also safeguard this in their organization,” the KSF said in its response. The trade association refers to this ISO 18295, which provides frameworks for this, also for crisis and incident management.

We had no contact with DNB or the banking industry association

When asked about cooperation with regulators such as DNB and fellow industry associations, the KSF indicates that there has been no contact with them about the bunq file. “We like to work with governments and regulators to ensure high-quality customer contact. In our opinion, we have no conflicting interest in this.” KSF wants to focus primarily on offering support to organizations in their pursuit of excellent customer contact and its permanent improvement.”

What will bunq change about customer contact? Ziptone also asked bunq about the previously promised improvements or changes in the design of customer contact. “At bunq, users have 24/7 control over their account without needing a helpdesk or account manager,” the bank's spokesperson responds. “Thanks to real-time push messages, they are immediately informed of what is happening on their account, they can immediately order passes and manage their account. If they have any questions, they can reach our support team via chat in the secure app.”

“Users can also intervene immediately if they suspect that something is wrong. For example, by changing the security code via the app or by calling our emergency number (+31 208 083 666). If for whatever reason this does not work, they can also contact our SOS support, which will help within 10 minutes.”

Bunq does not go into great detail about how the bank will adjust customer contact: “We are constantly working on implementing improvements. In recent times we have become aware that at times a human voice can be of great value. We are therefore looking at how we can improve in that area, without compromising the safety of our users. In line with this, we are working on other improvements, such as hiring more Dutch-speaking colleagues, to be less dependent on the English language,” the spokesperson told Ziptone.

(Ziptone/Erik Bouwer)

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