Banks urged to strengthen ethical standards in customer service

The Second Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana (BoG), Mrs Matilda Asante-Asiedu, has called on commercial banks to deepen collaboration and strengthen ethical standards in customer service delivery to foster greater trust, innovation, and resilience in the banking sector.

Delivering the keynote address at the Consumer Reporting Officers and Stakeholders Engagement Programme held in Accra, Mrs Asante-Asiedu urged banks to adopt a culture of excellence and continuous improvement under the theme, “Excellence in Service, Innovation in Delivery, and Security in Practice.”

She observed that today’s customers are more informed and demanding, expecting not only speed and efficiency but also empathy, fairness, and professionalism in how their issues are handled.

“Consumers expect excellence; that is the minimum. They want to walk into a banking hall and transact without hindrances. Beyond that, they desire fairness, speed, and professionalism in how we handle their complaints,” she stated.

According to the Deputy Governor, complaints lodged with the BoG rose from 695 in 2023 to 743 in 2024, a seven per cent increase. She noted that many of these could have been resolved internally by banks had there been stronger collaboration and proactive engagement among departments.

“Sometimes, you may not have the answer, but someone in another department might. Internal collaboration is key to delivering the level of service our customers deserve,” she emphasised.

Turning to the issue of digital transformation and financial fraud, Mrs Asante-Asiedu cautioned that while technology has expanded access and convenience, it has also heightened exposure to risks. The Bank of Ghana’s Fraud Report recorded 16,733 cases in 2024, up by five per cent from the previous year, with total losses nearing GH¢100 million.

More worrying, she said, was that 33 per cent of these cases involved bank staff, revealing systemic lapses in ethics and internal oversight.

“This is very concerning and calls on all of us, not just compliance officers, to be more intentional about ethics, discipline, and oversight. We must ensure that technology is not a tool for vulnerability but for trust,” she stressed.

Mrs Asante-Asiedu urged banks to embed cybersecurity into every layer of their operations, noting that no level of innovation or service excellence could compensate for weak security systems.

“Cybersecurity must be embedded in the DNA of every bank, not only in infrastructure but in every transaction and system update,” she noted.

She also encouraged financial institutions to leverage the Bank of Ghana’s regulatory sandbox, which allows banks and fintechs to test new innovations in a controlled environment before full-scale deployment.

Concluding, she underscored that service excellence, innovation, and security can only thrive when all staff take shared responsibility.

“It is not just the job of the compliance officer or the head of risk; it is everyone’s job,” she affirmed.