The financial service providers scored the worst rating on customer service in a recent study conducted by Aspect (News - Alert) Software. The study, which was conducted across 13 groups of organizations in various industries, was aimed at understanding the expectations and outlook of the customers in terms of customer satisfaction. The results from the study showed that only 17% of the total respondents believed that the financial services industry provides good service. The organizations under the gambit of financial service providers included banks, insurance providers, credit card companies, building societies and loan providers.

The most alarming find from the survey was that only 1% from the respondent group could recall good experience with their loan provider over the last year, while 13% were able to recall a healthy experience in terms of customer service from their building society or bank. On an overall basis, only 26% were able to recall an outstanding experience across the entire financial services sector on the customer service rating chart.

In a release, Mark King, Senior VP Europe and Africa at Aspect Software, said, “With such a sensitive topic as personal finance to conquer with every customer, keeping satisfaction levels high can be a strain on workforce skills and resources. An essential attribute of any perfect customer is high levels of loyalty. With such competitive markets and the ease at which consumers can change providers, it is absolutely essential that organizations - in any sector, but especially the financial sector - establish loyalty within customers.”

The findings from the survey also highlighted that around 33% of the respondents choose to switch their insurance provider after one bad experience, while 30% opted for switching their credit card provider with a single bad experience being the trigger point. Around 23% of the respondents preferred to change their bank/building society after a single bad experience.

One of the biggest findings from the study was that consumers preferred changing their service provider rather than escalate their bad experience for resolution. Around 1% of the consumers surveyed actually raised a complaint about their loan provider, while 3% and 2% of the respondents complained about their bank/building society and insurance providers, respectively.

According to the survey, social media is considered the last option to contact the financial service provider given the various concerns around security of the transactions with more than 60% percent of the respondents believing it to be a risky affair.

Aspect Software is a provider of contact center solutions across workforce optimization, customer interaction management and back-office operations.