- About Santander
Bank Polska - Strategy
and Management - Customers
- Introduction
- Our priorities – Bank As You Want It
- Multichannel approach – anyway you like it
- Accessible to all – You can count on us
- Security first
- Excellent customer service
- Ethical communication – simple and friendly language
- Responsible selling and prevention of misselling
- Our approach to complaints
- Knowledge that pays off
- Products and initiatives for retail customers
- Products and initiatives for SME customers
- Products and initiatives for customers of the Business and Corporate Banking Division
- Corporate and investment banking
- Support to customers in financial difficulty
- Employees
- Social
Engagement - About
the report
Support to customers in financial difficulty
GRI:
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[103-1, 103-2, 103-3]
Go to GRI list
According to statistics, one out of five bank customers has experienced problems with timely repayment of bank debt at least once. The role of the Bad Debts Monitoring and Support Office is to monitor overdue payments of both retail and SME customers at an early stage. The office uses a variety of convenient channels to contact customers, including phone calls, text messages and Santander internet.
Bad Debts Monitoring and Support Office
- Advisors help to resolve the problems with debt repayment.
- Regular telephone monitoring is based on partner communication with customers.
- Agreeing the terms of repayment of overdue amounts and working out a long-term solution which will minimize the risk of late payments in the future.
- Identification of customer issues and needs already at an early stage in order to choose the most appropriate solution in each situation.
Conversation standards
Our advisors’ goal is to solve the issue which is the root cause of late debt repayment and support the customer in choosing the best solution for the situation. We check whether our advisors talk to customers in line with the rules of partner communication and satisfy their expectations by launching a regular survey based on questions asked to customers right after they finish the conversation. Customers rate such aspects as friendliness, politeness and advisor’s commitment on a scale of 1 (least satisfied) to 7 (most satisfied).
GRI:
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[Custom indicator 12]
Number of customers invited to evaluate the bank's quality of service and advisory support to customers in difficult situation (customer survey).
Number of customers invited to evaluate the bank's quality of service and advisory support to customers in difficult situation (customer survey).
Go to GRI list
In the last two years we invited more than 65,000 customers to take part in the survey. The response rate was 27% and the customers satisfaction index (SAT-NET) was 79%
Self-management of overdue payments
At the beginning of 2018, we launched a new self-service tool for use in the early monitoring of overdue payments. The main purpose was to implement more advanced automated customer service processes in the first days after the due date.
Under the new functionality, bank customers can choose from the following contact channels:
Automated outgoing calls – without talking to an advisor, the customer can obtain information and make some arrangements e.g. declare the repayment date or request for a return contact.
Automated incoming calls handling system – the customer can also use a fully automated incoming calls service line.
Interactive text messages – a two-way text message communication with a response option.
Text messages with information.
Emails with information
Additionally, just like in the past, customers can declare the date of repaying the overdue instalment via the Santander internet platform, without waiting for a contact from the bank. Two standard solutions are available:
- Declaring repayment of an overdue amount within 7 days
- Requesting for a conversation with an advisor at a time convenient to the customer to agree a new repayment date.
Debt restructuring and fixing new repayment terms
The main strategy considered at first in the case of customers who experience problems with the repayment of their debts is restructuring. Each customer has an individually assigned relationship manager who recognizes and analyses the customer situation and proposes restructuring solutions which are flexibly adapted to the customer’s specific circumstances.
The possible solutions include:
- grace period in the repayment of the loan principal amount,
- temporary lowering of the loan instalment amount,
- extension of the loan tenor,
- agreeing a new repayment schedule covering both the overdue and non-overdue loan amounts,
- consolidation of obligations into one loan,
- voluntary sale of the property which secures repayment of the loan. If the realised amount is lower than the debt obligation value, the bank offers convenient terms of repayment of the remaining amount due.
Our bank is a pioneer in the area of offering voluntary property sale to customers.
Additionally, at many industry meetings we regularly highlighted the need to exempt persons whose debt is partly redeemed by a bank from the obligation to pay income tax.
We have also simplified the procedure of applying for modification of repayment terms:
all you need to do is call our helpline, or
go to the bank’s website and choose the „Problems with timely debt service” tab, download and complete the application form and mail it to us.
Borrower Support Fund
- The assistance includes repayment of the borrower’s debt obligations up to the maximum amount of PLN 1,500 a month for a period not longer than 18 months.
- The borrowers repays the aid received after a two-year grace period, over 8 years in equal, interest-free monthly instalments.
Swiss franc mortgages
Customers with mortgage loans denominated in Swiss francs (CHF) taken out from our bank can benefit from:
- Recognition of a negative CHF LIBOR reference rate.
- Applying a reduced 2% FX spread for CHF
- A possibility of a free-of-charge, temporary lowering of monthly repayments’ value e.g. a grace period in the loan principal repayment, loan repayment holiday or extension of the loan tenor
- A possibility of a free-of-charge conversion of the loan currency into PLN at an average exchange rate of the National Bank of Poland, at the customer’s request.
- A solution facilitating the sale of a property which secures an FX mortgage combined with a transfer of the mortgage to the new property.
- A possibility of obtaining repayable financial assistance from the Borrower Support Fund (as of February 19, 2016 pursuant to the Act of October 9, 2015 on support to borrowers with home loans who are in a financial difficulty).
