Monthly Archives: April 2010

Best Banks

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Having a bank is a necessity in modern-day living, but unfortunately many people are dissatisfied with the available choices.  At the start of this year Forbes listed America’s Best And Worst Banks, but it was somewhat surprising to see what they analyzed.

With Bank of America and Citigroup buoying their balance sheets and repaying billions of dollars in taxpayer bailout funds, the casual observer might assume the banking crisis is just about over. The casual observer would be wrong.  Lots of banks are going under these days. Here are the best and worst among the 100 largest.

Busted banks are still keeping the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. busy. In the past two months, 41 went under, surpassing the total of 26 for all of 2008. What’s more, by some measures bank balance sheets are in worse shape today than they were at the height of the financial crisis.

It is of course necessary that your bank will still be there when you wish to get your money.  However that is a very minimal criterion in selecting a bank.

Unfortunately reports since then indicate that on other dimensions, banks are not doing very well. One title suggested that Customer Satisfaction With the Biggest Banks Plummets.

While customer satisfaction with banks over all remained unchanged in the fourth quarter of 2009 from the year-earlier period, customer satisfaction with some of the biggest banks has declined to the lowest fourth-quarter levels in years.  The results, from the American Consumer Satisfaction Index, back up similar findings from a Forrester Research report.  This found that customers of the biggest banks in the United States were the least likely to believe their financial institution did what was best for them as opposed to what was best for the institution’s bottom line.

A report from Reuters today shows that there is no improvement: Large bank customers  are even more dissatisfied.

Some of the largest U.S. banks were ranked very low for retail customer satisfaction.  A US marketing research company study by J.D. Power and Associates implies that as some of the biggest banks get bigger, customers may not be happy.  The three biggest U.S. retail banks — JPMorgan Chase & Co’s Chase, Citigroup’s Citibank, and Bank of America Corp’s Bank of America — consistently rank at or near the bottom for customer service in the regions they serve.

This dissatisfaction with banks and the service they provide seems to be the case wherever you look.  Here are some results from the UK on how different services rank for customer satisfaction.

According to a recent survey conducted by moneysupermarket.com, it is hairdressers and hotels that that we think provide the best service. While banks and estate agents are thought to offer the worst.  Restaurants, coffee shops, garden centres, supermarkets, clothes stores and entertainment centres such as the cinema and bowling alleys all scored highly with consumers.

Here below are the results for this year.  Compared to last year’s survey it would appear that the service provided by banks has actually got worse. Banks have dropped a place in this table.

banks customer service

The industries at the bottom of the table have all traditionally suffered a bad press. Most of them – banks, energy companies, estate agents – demand hefty fees of their customers and provide necessary and essential  services, rather than luxuries.

Unfortunately the attitude in many banks may be as Tom Peters said, that “we are no worse than the others”.  If you are looking for one of the best banks, hopefully you can find one that searches for banking excellence, which includes not only safeguarding your money but also delivering a high level of customer satisfaction.

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Good Retirement Planning

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Most seniors look forward to a good life in retirement.  However there are now two key changes that mean that this only comes through careful financial planning for your retirement. 

  • Seniors are living longer
  • The major recession has depleted the funds they may have accumulated to cover their retirement.

In other words, you may have to trim your spending to make your savings last.  Just consider one of the examples quoted in the Star news item:

When Janet and Bob retired at age 55, they were earning a joint income of $400,000. Both were senior executives in the corporate world.  Now in their late 60s, they live more frugally. No longer do they own a cottage up north, buy new cars, eat in restaurants or rent condos in Florida with friends.  They live on a budget of $60,000 to $70,000 a year, which doesn’t include debt, to make their savings last.

Statistics Canada published a report in 2005, which detailed the spending patterns of older people:

  • Households age 75+ spent 73 cents of each income dollar on personal consumption.
  • Food, shelter and transportation made up the lion’s share (61 to 68 cents) of each consumption dollar.
  • Households pay more for government and private health insurance plans than 20 years ago.  There are higher out-of-pocket expenses for health costs not covered by insurance, such as prescription drugs, other medical equipment, dental services and eye care.

Here are some of the ways you can stretch your savings.

  • Live frugally and cut out unnecessary expenses
  • Stay healthy and vigorous
  • Give up the automobile and walk, take public transport or taxis as needed.  You’ll be much better off
  • Keep working part-time or make money out of your hobby
  • Use senior discounts to the maximum
  • Sell items on EBay
  • Learn to cook and cut down on prepared meals
  • Grow fruit and vegetables in your garden
  • Invite people to your home instead of dining out.
  • Buy any needed items on Craigslist or at Value Village
  • Sell unwanted belongings on Craigslist.
  • Have a financial planner and meet say twice a year to see if  you are still on track

As a retiree, you have fewer work-related expenses, you pay less in personal income tax and you contribute less to public benefit programs.  Since there is no need to leave an estate, with careful living you can enjoy what you have to the maximum and hope to die when your time comes just a little better than broke.

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Senior Label Or Senior Brand

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This post started off with a draft title of A Senior By Any Other Name.  I was picking up the theme of a Montréal Gazette article I enjoyed entitled, What’s in a name? That which we call a senior …

The reason why my interest was piqued by that article was that I recognized the author’s name, Janet Torge.  It reminded me of pleasant evenings spent playing badminton in Beaconsfield many years ago since she was a member of the club there.

Janet mused about some of the existing names that are being used to describe seniors:

  • Boomers
  • Seniors
  • Old people
  • Elders
  • Zoomers

All of them seem to have drawbacks and she came up with the pleasing alternative of Late Bloomers.

Avoiding the word plays that the Bloomers word might have suggested, I suddenly realized that there seemed to be an acceptance that what we are talking about here is a label for others to use about those of us who are over 50.

Since we are all living longer and staying healthier, I am not sure I will meekly accept a label that others might put on me.  Given many more years of productive and fulfilling life, it seems to me that a more proactive approach suggests we should not be looking for a Senior label.  A label is usually something you stick on an inanimate object.  What we need is a Senior Brand.

Why a brand?  Without a strong brand, others may assume the wrong things about seniors in general.  If we want to get more positive reactions, then we should not be shy about the positive contributions we can make.  The Senior Brand should certainly accentuate the positives.  Just think of some of the adjectives you might apply:

  • Distinguished
  • Experienced
  • Knowledgeable
  • Fund of memories
  • Energetic
  • Reliable
  • Inventive

At the same time as guardians of the brand we must make sure that any possible negatives that people may assume would apply are never visible.  That means avoiding any suggestion that we may be:

  • Weaker
  • Forgetful
  • Irascible
  • Vision challenged
  • Nodding Off
  • In our dotage

Thinking along those lines you might come up with the following (or their female equivalents where appropriate) as possible contenders for the brand name:

  • Chiefs
  • Heads
  • Sages
  • Senators
  • Authorities
  • Gurus
  • Nobles
  • Statesmen
  • Patricians
  • Patriarchs
  • Peers

Those are just to get your mental juices flowing.  If you can think of a more positive brand name for seniors, then why not add it in the comments.  This is really important because there are more and more of us every year who will be promoting that brand. Let’s find a brand we can be proud of.

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