'Ignorant, Helpless Consumers': Comments of the Week
July 15, 2016 7:30 AM
American Banker readers share their views on the most pressing banking topics of the week. Comments are excerpted from reader response sections of AmericanBanker.com articles and our social media platforms.
Responding to a CEO's views on customers' ability to monitor accounts making them "less likely to overdraw":
"Says a lot about bankers' mentality that they view informed customers as 'downsides.' If we could only return to the good old days of ignorant, helpless consumers."
Related Article:
On why consumers use overdraft protection:
"If that CEO actually said that
well, that's unfortunate and does not represent the majority of bankers. Bankers have no need to 'trick' customers into overdrafts. Overdraft is a service. It has a price that is known. An incredibly high percentage of people paying overdraft fees do it knowingly and by choice."
Related Article:
On finding balance between regulation and business moving forward:
"To borrow a current advertising slogan,
Regulators regulate; 'that's what they do.' Regulators generally see regulations as positives, not necessarily blind to unintended consequences, but more inclined to think that regulations are usually good solutions. Balance can be maintained with opposing political pressures and industry engagement."
Related Article:
On the need for diversity among leaders of regulatory agencies:
"The agencies in question are largely stocked with talent from the industry and businesses they are charged with regulating (that old revolving door). The lack of diversity, to some measure, reflects the composition of the landed gentry currently trusted with the keys to the vault. The kind of shrill call for blind measures of competence, would, I expect, backfire if actually put into practice. The good old GW Bush 'Gentleman's C' has not gone away: for proof, just take a look at any recent 401K statement."
Related Article:
A retort to the call for more diversity efforts:
"The entire premise/point of this article is irrelevant, if not totally meaningless. We should quit counting people based on their ethnicity or 'how they look,' but rather assess them based on their individual merits (like honesty, integrity, smarts, industriousness, empathy/caring, etc.). More specifically, there are no societal benefits achieved when a group of individuals simply 'look like America.'"
Related Article:
Agreeing with an op-ed arguing that physical branches still have a future:
"Money is deeply connected to identity and it is intensely personal in nature, despite being the ultimate fungible resource. We saw dire predictions of the death of branches when (1) ATMs were implemented in the 1980s, (2) call centers were rolled out in the late 80s, (3) when internet banking rolled out in the 90s. People have not changed. We still need to understand humans."
Related Article:
On using fintech methods to prevent fraud at marketplace lenders:
"Looks to me like this is a system in which if there can be fraud, there will be fraud, and there easily can be fraud."
Related Article:
