Across the counter:  125 years of service: Customers score First Bank high

By AYOOLA OLAOLUWA

On March 31st 2019, Nigeria’s largest financial powerhouse, FirstBank PLC, will be 125 years.To make the day a memorable one, the bank’s management has rolled out activities to celebrate the achievement.

While speaking at an event in Lagos tokick-startprogrammes to mark the anniversary,Chairman of First Bank Nigeria Limited, Ibukun Awosika, said the bank which has been providing financing for businesses in the country for the past 125 years is committed to the cause of nation building.

According to her, it will be a celebration of 125 years of supporting and enabling dreams, “125 years of resilience and relevance, 125 years of trust, safety and security, 125 years of long-term value to all stakeholders, 125 years woven into the fabric of our society and therefore we dare say, 125 years beyond comparison”.

In order to gauge the mood and reaction of its numerous customers to the bank’s performance and expectation, Business Hallmark visited some of its branches across Lagos. The verdict was encouraging.

At the Fagba, Iju Road Branch of the bank, our correspondent spoke with some of the customers who were on line to be attended to. One of them, Olumide Alawode, said he is particularly excited with the bank’s e-payment platform.

“The platform deployed is very easy to understand and operate. I think it is stark illiterates that won’t be able to do online banking on the bank’s platform. So, so simple and efficient. It has saved me from the usual holdup brought about by the deluge of customers that throng the bank’s banking halls daily.

“While it has helped reduced my many forays into banking halls to transact one form of business or the other, it is also cheaper unlike in the past when I spend a lot while dashing from home or the office to do traditional cash transfer. I only enter banking hall to drop cheques,” said Alawode.

To Goke Hamzat, a cobbler, the bank’s U-First loan schemehas empoweredhim to achieve seamless financial planning towards realizing his dreams for a brighter future.

“The loan I got from the First Bank’s U-First Loans scheme has really boostedmy shoemaking business.The scheme has helped me to acquire toolsto lift my business, as well as also meeting other financial needs when I wanted it.

“I don’t know of other banks, but First Bank is really the bank to beat, at least from my own little experience”, the elated Goke who spoke with BH at the bank’s ever busy Fagba branch on Iju Road declared.

Another customer of the bank, Demilade Alakija, said apart from the ever-presentcrowd that one meets in most First Bank’s branches most times, she was satisfied with its services.

“To be frank with you, I sometimes get put off by the deluge of crowd I meet anytime I go to transact business at the bank. But thankfully, that is where it ends. Though the queue may be long, service time is fast and efficient. No matter how long the queue is, I don’t normally spend morethan fifteen minutes in the bank, unlike in some of its competitors.

“I am also a beneficiary of the bank’s “UFirst Loans” scheme. The loan empowered me to acquire a Toyota Corolla car I am presently using. To top it up, the repayment plan is very flexible and favourable. I say thank you to Fist bank.”, said Alakija, an auditor working with the Lagos State Government.

Overall, while virtually all the customers who spoke to BHgave kudos to the bank for efficient service delivery, they however complained of the ‘machine-like’ disposition of its customer care officials.

“I don’t know why their customer service officers are so incapable of smiling when customers approach them.I have visited over twenty branches of the bank in Lagos alone and you rarely get a smile or ‘you are welcome’ gesture from them. To say I was overjoyed when a lady at the ACME Road branch unexpectedly smiled at me is an understatement. So big congratulations to First Bank ACME branch for possessing a customer facing personnel that smiles.

“One major reason for their coldness could be the pressure from the always demanding crowd that always besiege their stand to harass them for one assistance or the other.

“As a human development professional, I will advise that no customer care service personnel should be allowed to work for more than six hours at a stretch. With the kind of crowdalways they attend to, who are most times demanding and impatient, no one, not even the best trained professional can survive the pressure”, declared Dr. Bamidele Turner, a consultant with Corporate Office Max, Ikeja.

Business Hallmark visited the compact AjoseAdeogun branch of the bank and was impressed by how patient and detailed the customer service personnel attended to customers. Although they never smiled once during our30 minutes stay in the bank, they however paid attention to inquiries. Four customers who were attended to during the stay were more than satisfied.

One of them told our correspondent that though he was not a previous customer of the bank and was only there to make a deposit, he ended up opening an account in the bank.

From Iju, to Ojodu/Berger, ACME, Ijaiye Road, Ogba on the mainland to AjoseAdeogun and Marina, customers verdict was largely the same – ‘Satisfactory’. But in today’s banking standard, satisfactory is not enough; First Bank must strive for the first – excellence.Beyond this is another drawback – crowd control.

BH observed that in most of the branches visited, with the exclusion of the ones on the island, customers overwhelmed the personal on duty. Right from the entrance, you must queue to get a service. You queue to access the entrance security doors, you queue to withdraw or deposit funds, you queue to be attended to by a customer service agent and you queue to use the automated teller machines.

It was however observed that services were prompt and efficient. It took an average of three minutes to attend to a customer in all the branches visited.The Western Union section could easily recall the days of tally number. But the innovation of envelope deposit for amount before N40000 is a masterstroke that empties the banking hall in a jiffy.

In all it is a mixed bags of praises and pains; yet it remains the attracting and comfort of the mature banking public.