By Jill Fraser for Lending Central

Business confidence has leaped to a seven-year high but business customers confess a decreased level of satisfaction with the Big Four banks.

Trends based on a six-month roll

Overall the TNS Business Finance Monitor (BFM) shows a long-term improvement in business customers’ satisfaction with their banks since the BFM started in 2001.

(Satisfaction is based on business customers who said they were ‘very satisfied’ or ‘fairly satisfied’ with their relationship with their main financial institution (MFI).)

Looking at the trend in the last six months to September, 72.6% of business banking customers were satisfied with the relationship with their MFI.

However, each of the big four banks has seen decreased satisfaction, and the combined big four is down by 3% (to 69.6%).

ANZ has seen the biggest decrease in satisfaction by 5.1%, although its satisfaction levels remain the highest among the big four at 72.7%.

Westpac remains in second position (71.9%), followed by CBA (69.1%).

NAB is trailing slightly at 65.4% with satisfaction decreasing 4.7% compared to 6 months ago.

Trends based on a 12-month roll

In the 12 months to September satisfaction levels have decreased by 6.1% compared with the same period a year earlier.

There has been a decrease of 8.6% in business customer satisfaction with the four major banks relative to the same period 12 months ago (71.1%).

ANZ’sbusiness customers remain the most satisfied of the four major banks (at 75.1%), despite a decrease of 8.7% over the last 12 months.

Westpac has also had a decline of 8.7%, to 72.4%, ranking second amongst the four major banks.

CBA’s business banking satisfaction has similarly decreased 8% to 70%, and NAB’scustomer satisfaction remains the lowest amongst the four major banks at 67.8%, with a 9% decrease in customer satisfaction over the last 12 months.

St George’s business banking customer satisfaction has decreased 10.4% over the last 12 months (to 74.5%), although the bank remains in second position amongst the five majors.

Bank of Queensland and Bendigo Bank continue to have the highest customer satisfaction levels of any of the banks, with Bank of Queensland at 90.9% and Bendigo Bank at 90.5%.

Overall 73.6% of business banking customers were satisfied with the relationship with their main financial institution (MFI).

TNS Global Business Finance Monitor Manager Australia,
Jenny Powell says that the steady decrease in satisfaction over the last year was probably inevitable given the current economic climate, especially for the big banks.

Other factors that came into play were mergers and consolidations.

“Banks are definitely taking this very seriously,” Powell told Lending Central.

“They scrutinise these results because they’re constantly trying to improve the service they provide and the happiness and satisfaction of their customers.

“We run this study in a couple of other markets around the world and in comparison to the UK dissatisfaction here is not as low as it is there. This is a positive sign for banks here but it’s still a concern that there is a downward trend.”

The TNS Business Finance Monitor (BFM) began running studies in 2001. It tracks the growth of banks in terms of satisfaction and the effort that some banks have put in to improve their services.

The current report shows that dissatisfaction has started to slow and despite more recent trends, satisfaction levels remain higher than the long-term average.

Powell predicts that some levelling out may occur in the next six to 12 months as economic conditions start to improve.