Abu Dhabi - MENA Herald: The UAE Banks Federation (UBF), a professional body representing 48 member banks operating in the UAE, has announced that it has secured support of the Central Bank for its initiative which aims at developing a unified framework for handling complaints of bank customers in the country.
“The proposed framework was developed as part of UBF’s continued efforts to enhance customer experience and bring higher levels of transparency and efficiency in addressing the concerns of bank customers in the UAE. The Central Bank’s blessing of the framework paves the way for the country-wide implementation of this landmark initiative which comes in line with global best practices and in order to ensure that customers concerns , rights and interests are well taken care of and protected,” said H.E. Abdulaziz Al Ghurair, Chairman of UBF.
As an expression of its commitment to customer’s satisfaction and happiness and to ensure consistent service excellence, UBF has unveiled its ‘Service Promise’ for bank complaints handling, which is designed as a guideline for UAE banks to follow in responding to complaints from customers. The ‘Service Promise’ is a set of guidelines for conduct which sets standards of good banking practice for UAE banks to observe when dealing with complaints from customers. While the ‘Service Promise’ is not a legislation, member banks have agreed to adopt and honor the obligations the Promise sets out.
“The purpose of the ‘Service Promise’ is to upgrade the quality of service that banks customers, across the UAE, will receive when they file a complaint about a product or service. Through providing a set of guidelines and adequate quality assurance to customers, the ‘Service Promise’ will raise industry standards and ensure standardized processes and experiences across banks, and so help encourage consumer confidence in the banking industry,” Al Ghurair said.
The ‘Service Promise’ is built around five guiding principles – transparency, fairness, empathy, reliability, and accessibility – which the Federation views as core to daily banking operations and the care with which customer complaints need to be addressed. It lays out clear definitions and processes that banks in the UAE are expected to follow in accepting, communicating and resolving complaints from customers.
“The guiding principles are designed to ensure that banks in the UAE conduct themselves in a manner that is consistent with the highest ethical standards and demonstrate the banking industry’s aspirations to be in line with global best practices for the way banks attend to consumer complaints. As a banking ecosystem, we are committed to operating according to this ‘Service Promise’ and uphold our five guiding principles in handling customer complaints,” Al Ghurair added.
Customers will be able to lodge a complaint through a variety of channels including call center, branch, internet and mobile banking, e-mail and web complaint forms, and social media. The bank will notify the complainant of receipt of complaint within two business days of submission and, in the event the complainant hasn’t already been provided with a resolution, he/she will be provided an estimated resolution time within four business days. If the bank is unable to solve the complaint within 60 days, the complainant will be provided with information about their options for external escalation.