Here’s one for the books.I got a letter the other day from a big bank that just merged with another big bank informing me that my securities account, which I have had for ten years, will now be subject to a new annual fee of $50.
The letter was crafted as positively as possible, but gave me three options: Sell my shares, liquidate my shares, or they would send me my shares. No other options were given.
In other words: Go away.
The letter requested a phone call. So I called. I asked if I was being fired as a customer. The guy on the other end assured me I was not – until I got to the root of the problem. Which was: My account is not big enough for them to justify keeping it.
“Why didn’t you call me?” – I asked.
He said, “Look, I was given 400 of these accounts, I don’t have time to call these people. If I spent all my time on $1,000 accounts, I wouldn’t make any money.”
Let me get this straight – he just fired 400 customers? How long did it take to get them? How many other people at the bank sent this letter out?
I further found out that this letter was sent “In compliance with [their] legal rules and regulations.” I have no idea what that means, but I have a feeling that it’s a method of saving their ass at the expense of mine.
This is a bank, mind you, that is spending millions of dollars in advertising soliciting my business with the most inane commercials I have ever seen on the one hand, while on the other hand spending hundreds of thousands of dollars getting rid of me.
What genius is leading this pack?
When they looked at the dollars and cents, they decided that my ten-year-old account was not profitable enough for them.
I guess they weren’t counting on the fact that I’m able to reach a few million of their customers by telling this story. They were also unaware that I have another account at the bank, which, without going into numbers, let me just say, exceeds their minimum requirements by a substantial amount.
When I asked the guy who wrote me the letter (he’s a broker) about my other account, he couldn’t even find it in their “system.”
“How many Jeffrey Gitomers do you have there?” – I asked.
“None that I can find,” he said.
“That would be an omen,” I said.
Now I could have asked for his boss, and gone through the “Don’t you know who I am?” argument, and gone on a rant for ten minutes about how insulted I was that they would throw me in the gutter.
But instead, I will quietly walk away and take my business elsewhere.
Please let my story be your lesson. There is no account “too small” that might not one day grow into a big account. Corporate bean counters who only measure accounts by profitability are doomed to long-term failure.
Oh, in the short term, they’re building “shareholder value.” But in the long term they are destroying loyalty and goodwill, and generating negative word-of-mouth advertising.
At these times, my best advice to you is to guard every one of your customers with your life for these reasons:
They may grow into big customers one day.
They may refer big customers any day.
If you fire them, the ripple effect will be much more costly than the few cents you lose by keeping them.
Best insult: As I was talking to the broker guy who wrote me the letter, and finally got him to admit that he was firing me as a customer, and that the bank had made a management decision to get rid of all dinky accounts, he sealed his fate forever by adding: “I can’t apologize for a policy I didn’t make.”
If you’re looking for a sentence that defines corporate idiocy, that one would make the dictionary.
I often wonder what goes on in the meetings at these companies where these decisions are made. I wonder if Bill Gates once had a small account someplace in this bank, and got fired as well.
I wonder how they go home at night and tell themselves they’re doing the best they can for their customers.
I’m certain it’s somewhere in their mission statement. But they must have not read that part.
Our policy? We treat all of our customers the same: Like Gold.
Free GitBit: Want to know what bank it was? Sure you do. I’ll tell you who it was, and what they could have done instead of firing me. Go to www.gitomer.com and enter “bank” in the GitBit box.
President of Charlotte-based Buy Gitomer Inc., Jeffrey Gitomer gives seminars, runs annual sales meetings, and conducts training programs on selling and customer service. He can be reached at salesman@gitomer.com
by Jeffrey Gitomer
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13.04.2004