Bank Mergers:  Customers groan over poor integration.

In January this year, Access bank announced with pomp and fanfare that it has finalized its merger & acquisition exercise with Intercontinental bank. In fact the statement announcing this full integration stressed that intercontinental bank has ceased to exist as a commercial entity and that full integration has been concluded after securing all the regulatory, judicial and shareholder approval.

Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede, MD of Access Bank declared with great satisfaction that the integration occurred well ahead of schedule due to the professionalism and competence of his management team. In his words ““The conclusion of this transaction is a significant step forward for the Nigerian banking sector; it has preserved thousands of Nigerian jobs and protected the savings of millions of Nigerian citizens. It brings together the proven prudential management of Access Bank and the extensive geographical footprint of Intercontinental Bank, with one of the largest networks of branches and Automated Teller Machines.”

With this declaration, the 5.7 million customers from this integration, which makes Access bank one of the largest banks in Nigeria, must have felt that they are in for the best in terms of worthwhile services. Regrettably investigations reveal that banking transactions in Access bank have basically gone comatose.

When the management of Access Bank went public, placing adverts to assure customers of the banks that there would be seamless and better service, as well as a synchronization of all accounts of customers in the merging entities, What most customers believe they meant was simply this- if Bank “A”, acquires Bank “B”, a customer of Bank “A” or Bank “B” can decide to transact his business in either Bank “A” or “B” seamlessly

Our Investigations reveal that customers of former Intercontinental banks are most times turned down at most original Access bank branches claiming that connectivity issues of not been able to access customers accounts hinders prompt services. A customer who preferred to be called Godwin claimed that last week he went to a former Intercontinental bank branch on Adeniyi Jones Avenue, Ikeja- Lagos, with a third party Access bank cheque. After staying on the queue amidst other customers for hours, he got to the counter only to be   turned down with the excuse that accounts of original Access bank customers cannot be accessed from their branch.  He was directed to visit an original Access bank branch on the same street if wants to transact business with the cheque.

The visit to another Access bank still on Adeniyi Jones Avenue by our source equally revealed the poor level of customer relationship management even in the so-called Original Access Bank branches. According to Godwin, “ I spent over four hours to cash a N15,000 cheque. It was horrendous. I just hope Access has not bitten more than it can chew. Two customers had to exchange blows on the queue due to stress, tension and exhaustion. Really my experience that day at the former Intercontinental bank was much better. .It is shocking when you here report that ex- intercontinental banks staff are the target for rationalization whereas they should be the elite bankers Access should retain. It is unfortunate that rogue banking has put dedicated Intercontinental Bank staff in this terrible position”.

Another customer who referred to himself as Kayode alleged that he paid cash into his Intercontinental bank account at an Access bank branch in central Ikeja and it was close to one week before the transaction could reflect in his account.  Another customer, who spoke to us in one of the former Intercontinental Bank branches, said he was surprised when he was informed by the teller that he could not make a deposit into his Access Bank account because she (teller) did not have access to it. When Pankereonline enquired at the customer service desk as to the cause of these hitches, the response was that the banks connecting servers were down.

Also, it was gathered that the bank had shut down some branches of former Intercontinental Bank nationwide. A visit by our correspondent to two of Intercontinental Banks branches in Ibafo Area near Ogun state confirmed the report. The branches were shut with only security personnel attending to customers. When asked why the branch did not open, one of the security personnel told our correspondent that the network was down and directed our correspondent to another fomer Intercontinental branch.      

When the Brand Communication Head of Access bank,Mr. Austin Edoja Peters, he promised to respond later. However subsequent SMS and phone calls did not receive any respone as at press time.

The reaction of Mr. Eddy Ademosu of former Intercontinental bank  was that  all banks have their challenges so he would not really comment on our findings.

On a positive note, BI investigations also reveal that the merger between EcoBank and Oceanic Bank has indeed been seamless; visits to numerous EcoBank branches within Lagos confirmed this position. At over four Oceanic and Eco bank branches visited by BI, the tellers were willing to collect both Oceanic and EcoBank  cheques for transactions.

Our Investigations on the Finbank and FCMB merger reveals that even Access bank is in a better position. According to enquiry made from the Customer Service desk in one of the branches of FCMB, it was gathered that both banks are yet to synchronize their services after the takeover was signed last year. It further revealed that the banks still run their different operations at the moment and are yet to get any instruction from management.

A source from FCMB who spoke extensively on phone said, “The whole merger thing so far is still on paper and we are understudying different dynamics, meaning that merged operations will take effect effectively within the next one year, what is happing right now is that staff drawn from branches of both banks have embarked on training to ensure that they are able to manage the operations and integrate perfectly”  

However  a visit to a Finbank, brnch in Ikeja brought some shocking revelations. Staff  were not even aware of the merger and acquisition plans.  One of the Customers Relationship Officers claimed since there is no statement issued from management about any synchronization of banking operations between FCMB and Finbank we don’t know anything about it.. Perhaps this is an indication of how internal communication processes have degenerated within the Finbank system.