I was amazed to get a letter from my bank this week.
Apparently, I'm in credit on my credit card. Leaving aside the rather inverted idea of a card that gets you into debt being a 'credit' card, the letter was a bit grim. It had that finger-wagging, milk-monitorish tone that bank admin staff sometimes adopt.
It was a classic admin letter - written entirely from the bank's point of view, treating me as a bit thick (ok, I am, but I still don't like being called thick) and making no attempt to build any sort of relationship with me. You'd have thought, by now, we'd have learned a bit more about customer communications. Apparently not at HSBC.
The note was also a bit convoluted:
"You may be unaware the bank requests you do not place your account into credit; this is stated in our Terms."
I particularly liked the capitalisation of "Terms" - they must be ever so important if they need a capital letter. I also liked the implication of "You may be unaware..." - it's always good to call your customers morons; goes down reeeeeally well.
Of course, like every admin letter a bank ever sends, it was in the third person: "the bank requests". In my opinion, the only person in the UK who is allowed to use the third person is the Queen. And of course, "requests" sounds more pompous than "asks", so the bank thinks it must be better.
Now, what was wrong with:
"We've noticed you've overpaid your credit card account. Please call us and we'll transfer your money to your bank account - or you could even use it to start a cash or equity ISA with us..."
Simple. Easy. Understandable. And even an attempt to sell the customer something. Hell, why not?
But it got better...
"Therefore would you please contact us, supplying a UK sterling bank code and account number, so we may return these funds to you."
Why? Why be so bloody pompous and Dickensian? I'm sure that Paula Stevens from Card Operations doesn't speak like this. I'll bet she's good fun, enjoys a laugh, uses the word "money" more often than "funds" and would never call a customer "unaware" (although I'll bet she thinks a lot of them are utter morons - and fair game, we probably are). I'll bet if I met her she'd be good company. So why does she write like this?
It's not Paula's fault. The blame lies firmly on the polished glass desktops of her bosses. They think it's OK to invest no money or time at all in admin letters.
"So what? They're just admin letters, aren't they?"
Well, no they're bloody well not.
This is the first letter I've EVER had from HSBC that's been signed by a real person - thank you Paula. But with it, all the branding work your agencies have done has been dropped in the shredder. You tell me in your ads that you're all friendly and nice and modern. You tell me that you care about me as a customer. You tell me that you're different from all the other banks. But you're telling me porkies - this letter shows you're just the same, stuffy old bank that you always were.
How much did HSBC spend on its brand last year? It'll be in the millions in the UK alone. And every time a letter like this goes out, it's wasted. The dissonance between the brand communication and the customer services communication is massive. It's the corporate equivalent of a warm handshake followed by a slap round the face.
It would be less damaging if Stephen Green, the bank's Chairman, sat in his office stuffing fifties from the ad budget into the fireplace, handfuls at a time.
Here's a suggestion - invest just 1% of your above the line budget to make sure the brand message is carried through into ALL your customer communications. The impact would be massive.
