Correction to post from December, word to Ubank

Back in December I posted a piece on banks and financial organisations using social media. There was a reference there to Ubank and it appears that I made an error on how things are done (which as a customer I should have known better!)...

 

But as a bank that is using Social properly, they got back to me with the correction. So apologies for the error and thanks to Monty H for correcting my error as per below.

And why did it take me so long to acknowledged them? Well at the time of the post I was on a plane on the way to (what seemed like a good idea) take an extended holiday in a country with little internet...

 

Monty H, UBank said...

Hello, Thanks for your reference to UBank - we're certainly doing our best to be within arms reach of our customers - wherever they are online. Just a minor correction: "...then retain them by calculating interest monthly rather than daily..." We calculate interest on the daily closing credit balance of your UBank USaver, up to and including the last day of the month. Interest is credited to your account on the last business day of each month (or at account closure). Thanks for the post, have a great weekend. Speak soon, Monty H Head of Online, UBank

Friday, December 11, 2009 1:11:00 PM GMT+11:00

Repurcussions of not acting on what you heard

Most of the time I talk to clients about how to best manage and develop their relationships with their customers and stakeholders through listening and conversation, but generally the client knows their customer better than I ever will. They know better than I do as to what will resonate with them than I ever can when I first walk into a meeting with them. If they didn't, they would not be in business.
Today I was reminded of this when against better judgment I was pressured into allowing someone to push a product on one of my clients who had recently signed a contract with us for a similar product. The situation meant trying to tell the client to buy a product that cost more, would take several times longer to get the results that we had told them, correctly, we could deliver in a six week period.
It is not that the alternative product did not have benefits, it is not that we weren't listening to our client as to what they wanted, it was the fact that we were, for want of a better word, dumb enough to try and push something inappropriate to their immediate needs.
It was perhaps one of the most uncomfortable meetings I have had to attend with an eerie silence over it that left me knowing that something was not right and that there would repercussions. Sure enough, as the strategist on the job the client turned around and asked me to be removed from project. I do not blame them - here they were expecting a meeting to talk about timelines and instigation of a community and instead were being told that they did not have the right tool.

"hang on, are you telling us that you cannot achieve what we paid for?"

It has left me with a bitter taste in my mouth. After developing a relationship for 6 months I let someone else pressure me into doing something that I knew was not what the client wanted or had paid for. Luckily I have excellent colleagues who are able to continue managing the relationship and have some hard work ahead to prove that we are capable of doing what we said we could and regaining trust.
As for me, I learnt the lesson of listening and then against better judgment, allowing someone else who did not know my customer to tell me what they needed and press it on them. One big mistake that I have certainly learnt from.