The Unsettling Normalization of Banking Fraud
This month alone, I’ve come across 2 posts on social media alerting the customers of a certain bank to be wary of saving their money there. The authors of both posts warned that money in the bank’s personal accounts was not safe and they encouraged the readers to watch out for any suspicious activity. The unspoken message was, get your money out of the bank or you’ll find some funds missing from your account very soon.
The jist of the warning for me was the rising trend in fraud that is perpetrated by young people in a country whose unemployment rate is 22 percent and increasing. It is such an unfortunate situation for the employer, the customers, the banking industry and the general population.
I worked in a bank many moons ago and the word ‘fraud’ was almost nonexistent. We were young tellers, fresh from university, with hope in our eyes and a drive to succeed in our work. We put in long hours and often competed among ourselves to see who recorded the most transactions at the end of each day. Getting the highest number of transactions was key because the bank was infamous for having very many customers, so all tellers had a target of a 7-minute turn-around time for each customer.
Seven minutes was the total time a customer took from entering the banking hall, filling in a deposit or withdrawal slip, queuing, providing his details to the teller, making the deposit or withdrawal, and finally exiting the hall. So the higher your transactions, the more likely you were to meet the turn-around time for each customer, and the greater their satisfaction. The winner would receive lots of compliments from colleagues and an acknowledgement from the HR office.
“There is only one boss. The customer.” Sam Walton
Back then, our main concern was ensuring the accuracy of withdrawals and deposits whilst meeting our turnaround target. It was very rare to hear of a staff member actually defrauding the customers’ off their money. In fact, we had to adhere to a strong moral and ethical code of conduct governing the banking profession.
Furthermore, the culture of customer satisfaction was ingrained in us. We kept our mobile phones out of reach and did not attend to personal calls during working hours, unless it was an emergency. Our mission was to keep the customers happy. We were trained to increase our transaction speeds, reduce the customer’s turnaround time, and to treat the customer with dignity and respect.
I don’t know when or where the wheels of this well-oiled train started coming off. A visit to any of the bank’s branches today will reveal a staff’s high disregard for anyone other than self. The staff are slow, lack initiative, and show no motivation for their work. I think the knowledge that customers’ savings and loans keep the bank running so that their salaries are paid is totally lost on them.
Coupled with the cultural trend towards quick, get-rich schemes that give the illusion of making money with minimal effort, then we have the makings of a great disaster. You see, the staff working in most banks, from entry level to middle management is mostly the youth aged between 20 years and 35 years.
The youth represents a vibrant and energetic population group that can build wealth over time and manage it well into their old age. It is unfortunate that instead of being part of the solution, we have become a part of the problem. We have added to the moral decay in the society and our greed for quick money to show off, rival our friends or for political power has further decayed our moral fabric and raised more criminals.
From the perspective of a bank customer, I will say that it is very concerning that cases of fraud are not highlighted enough and justice not fully achieved. It is unacceptable to save your money somewhere and have it stolen, then get the run-around when you raise an issue and demand accountability. Bank fraud is a moral and criminal offence. But perpetrators are not shamed by the society and they do not receive a sentence that is commensurate with their crime. Justice would give the affected customer an opportunity to ensure the perpetrator is locked up and to sue for loss (of funds and opportunity of use) and grief. Justice for me would be to bankrupt that perpetrator, let him/her pay at 10x or 100x the amount stolen to restore the bank and the customers to the financial position they would be in had the fraud not occurred.
From the perspective of the employer (the bank), it is quite daunting to foresee any unscrupulous behavior of its staff. But, banks have to put in measures that keep confidential details and funds from unauthorized access and use. Their systems have to issue warnings when a staff member keeps transferring funds from dormant accounts to another accounts, and a higher-ranking staff member keeps approving such transactions. There should be integrated intelligent systems that record and analyze the behavior of each customer- how, when and where they make their transactions, and what amounts they transact. Any deviation from the analyzed behavior would trigger an alert to the bank and the customer for approval. It would be tedious at first but rebuilding the customers’ trust makes this very necessary.
For the youth out here, there is no gain in stealing. Why are we rushing to get rich? Being rich and being wealthy are two different things. Why expend all your energy to get rich by defrauding people and yet you’d have attained wealth by growing your marketable skills to match an unmet need? There is no rationalization for succumbing to pressure to fulfill your own wants and needs (self-interest) at the expense of someone else. And there is no justification for giving the youth a bad rap because you want to defraud the bank and its customers. Let’s make money legally and enjoy it with our future generations in peace.
Bank fraud is a criminal offence and seen be seen as such by everyone. Banks, customers, the government, security agencies, and the society should appreciate the grievous nature of this crime and hold all wrongdoers accountable. And when customers raise issues concerning fraud, all stakeholders should take it seriously. Victimizing a client who has lost funds is not the way to go, at all.
The banking profession should restore the culture of respecting their customers’ and their accounts (property). No one knows what customer goes through to make money. Bankers do not know how much time and energy each customer exchanges for money, the money that is banked with them. Only the wearer of the shoe knows where it pinches. So respect and due care should be given to each shoe that steps into the bank’s hall or online platform.
