Jun 30, 2024 09:29 PM
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From the perspective of interest rate on deposits, the bank is alright but the interest rate is not great when compared to other small finance banks such as Suryoday Bank. Of course, if you tell that to Equitas Bank, they will tell you that they will give you superior customers service! There is no such thing as superior customer service from Equitas Bank. In fact, their customer service is bad!
The pillars of any bank, among others, is accuracy and timeliness. Of course, there are other important elements such as financial stability but I am not talking about that since customers come to a bank only when they are sure of financial stability. Once you come to a bank like Equitas Bank, you expect that their data is accurate and timely. To me, it matters because if their data is not timely or accurate, then I suffer immensely at the time of filing Income Tax Returns.
I know from bitter personal experience that they commit unforgivable blunders in calculating interest income and TDS for customers like my family, year on year, consistently. There is no excuse for any bank to do that! It is shameful, unpardonable, unacceptable and unforgivable. Yet, they keep doing that. This year too, their data was wrong. We had to identify the blunders and tell them. Rectification is still in progress. We are already delayed in filing our ITRs by about 4 weeks. We will be lucky if we can file it within the deadline, going by past negative experiences
Whenever we escalate the matter, it goes to Miss Smitha Kumar, Head, Customer Experience of Equitas Bank. I have escalated to the bank's senior management team too. Their response is to apologise profusely but the blunders never stop. In recent years, they have started avoiding me and let their subordinates talk to me. So much for Voice of Customer! These people draw huge salaries but can't talk to customers or stop making blunders ever!
They all can talk big, but their actions are quite small, if not zero. My family has faced numerous issues with their calculation of interest income and TDS till the last date of filing of Income Tax Returns. There have been multiple other issues too. The issues keep occurring consistently year on year owing to the blunders of the bank. When escalated, Ms.Smita Kumar has informed me that they can not provide compensation but they will provide exceptional service. This from Head of Customer Service as if exceptional service is reserved for few customers. Further, the promised exceptional customer service is never to be found as the same blunders keep occurring consistently year on year. When we do their job for which we are not paid for and ask for mitigation, she tells us it is not in their policy but the interesting part is that they keep breaching their policy time and again through their blunders, unless blunders are allowed as part of their policy. That time, policy never stops them, in making consistent blunders but when it comes to compensating customers, suddenly, they remember policy!
This year too, we are fighting to get their blunders, righted. Till now, no success and our ITRs have already been delayed by 4 weeks. It is not just Ms.Smitha Kumar - their entire management team is voiceless when it comes to the blunders committed by the bank and the mitigation to customers! They literally run away from their customers and here they are delivering big big speeches about customer services. In the initial days, this lady told me that they are considering putting me on their panel of customers to receive feedback on bank for a certain token remuneration. They never came back on that - I guess the way I got back to them on their blunders, did not serve their purpose of a tame and pacifist customer who will give only positive feedback and not critique them on their grave errors! Rather shameful management team who is full of words but zero on positive action!
If you are banking with them, be careful and check their data else you will certainly end up in soup!
