Banks’ staff are scapegoats for sins of the fat-cats

IN recent months frontline bank officials have experienced a new phenomenon at work — an unprecedented level of vitriol and abuse, including threats of violence from bank customers and members of the public who blame the regular staff working in the branches for the excesses of a handful of high-fliers at the top of these institutions.

Bank staff feel particularly aggrieved because the new culture in banking — which has led to most of the current difficulties in the financial services sector — is one they have spoken out against on many occasions in the past — through their representatives in IBOA the Finance Union.

Five years ago IBOA warned that the introduction of new practices within the sector — driven by the banks’ obsession with maximising short-term shareholder value at the expense of long-term stability and prudence — would not only inconvenience customers and pressurise staff but ultimately undermine the entire financial services sector. But at the height of the property boom, no one wanted to hear negative warnings from a bunch of party-poopers.

IBOA pointed out that the once simple notion of a bank as a place where you used to either deposit or withdraw money had been replaced by a far more complicated concept in which banks sell ‘financial products’ using high pressure retail strategies.

Under this new approach, bank staff have been required to meet a range of performance targets (even more inappropriate in these recessionary times) in order to supplement a very modest basic wage.

The stress of working in such a culture has been further intensified by significant rationalisation programmes implemented in recent years — as part of the drive by senior managers to push costs down and force profits up. For many bank officials, one of the few compensations for the major change in their working lives used to be the allocation of bank shares.

These were generally held as tuition fees for teenage children or rainy day money for later life. But whatever they may have once represented, they are of course virtually worthless now.

So in sharp contrast to the fat-cats, the overwhelming majority of bank officials receive very modest rewards for their loyalty and hard work.

Like many staff in the health service, bank officials take a great deal of pride in the role they perform but are extremely frustrated by the circumstances in which they have to discharge it. Public opinion rarely blames nurses for the problems of the health service: indeed, they usually receive well-earned praise for continuing to work in spite of all the system’s shortcomings.

Unfortunately many members of the public seem reluctant to give bank staff the same consideration.

They are being scapegoated unjustly for the sins of others. It is high time reason prevailed.

Larry Broderick

General Secretary

IBOA The Finance Union

IBOA House

Stephen Street Upper