December 4, 2013 - A quarter of Brits would seriously consider switching their bank if it suffered a major technology failure, such as a problem with ATMs, according to a survey from Fujitsu published just two days after the RBS meltdown.
For several hours on Cyber Monday, RBS, NatWest and Ulster Bank customers were unable to use their cards at ATMs, in-store or online. The meltdown prompted fury on social media and could cost the group business if the Fujitsu poll of 3000 people - carried out before the outage - is to be believed.
IT failure actually scores fairly low on respondents' lists of causes for leaving a provider - 70% would seriously consider switching if they had their personal data lost in a security breach, while 59% would ponder a move if they experienced poor customer service.
Meanwhile, only 36% of those quizzed trust financial services firms with their data - a fall of 15% over the decade. Although banks are still more trusted than most other business sectors, they score an average of 3.07 points when respondents were asked to use a scale of one to five.
Fujitsu says that data security and privacy have been catapulted into the public consciousness by the NSA revelations of whistle-blower Edward Snowden. Last week the EU insisted that it has received written assurances from the US government that NSA spies did not tap into financial messaging data transmitted over the interbank Swift network.
Brits are also less than convinced that the data banks have on them is being put to good use. Less than a quarter of respondents think that banks and insurance firms are using the vast troves of information at their disposal to improve their services. Around 30% think that retailers do a better job in this regard.
While 34% say that banks know who they are and can quickly and easily access their account information when they call, 38% disagree with the suggestion that they might receive more targeted and personalised offers and services.
Nearly a third note that there is little consistency of user experience when dealing with those companies across different channels and around a quarter say that their personal information is represented incorrectly on official communications.
