Imagine this. It`s 18h30 in the evening and you just got home from a long day at the office. You`re looking forward to a hot meal and a long bath, but alas - what do you find? Your electricity supply has been disconnected! You phone the local municipality`s after hours number, only to discover that the electricity was disconnected due to a payment problem. Not so - you say. Your account payments have never been in arrears, and debit orders are paid consistently on the 14th of every month. So what do you do? Phone your bank? At 19h00 in the evening? Ha! Unless, of course, you bank with 20twenty!
And that`s exactly what Dave Polley, a passionate 20twenty customer did. He phoned his bank`s 24-hour contact centre and got through to Marc Smith, a member of the 20twenty Wired Warriors squad (as the extremely proficient contact personnel at 20twenty are known as). Marc checked Dave`s target accounts and confirmed that the municipality had indeed processed the payment that very same week. Instead of leaving it to the customer to sort out with the authorities, he phoned the municipality and stayed on the line with the after hours personnel until his customer`s electricity supply was switched back on.
Call it extraordinary, even outrageous. But according to Christo Davel, head of consumer banking for Standard Chartered Bank, South Africa, there are certain things better left to the experts when it comes to sorting out your finances - and that`s where 20twenty comes in.
In fact, this is the type of extraordinary customer service that has become synonymous with digital financial services company 20twenty since its inception in July 2001. With its high-tech head office at trendy Longkloof Studios in Cape Town, 20twenty presents a mainstream contemporary alternative to banking to customers countrywide.
There are numerous such incidents where the Wired Warriors - most unexpectedly - stepped in to save the day on behalf of their customers. However, the extraordinary customer services aside, it is the bank`s cutting edge products and services that set it apart from the traditional banking as we came to know it.
During the time before going into curatorship, 20twenty offered some of the most inventive products and instantaneous services in the history of banking. For example, have you ever experienced the drudgery of having to change banking details on your many debit orders when defecting to another financial institution? No such sweat when you changed to 20twenty! The Wired Warriors at your new bank did all of that on your behalf! They even hand-deliver your brand-new MasterCard-linked 20twenty card to your door within four to six days of application. (*see notes to editor)
Davel explains that, according to the 20twenty business model, the business is built on the premise that by serving its customers with smart, innovative services on a differentiated service model, it would be rewarded with loyalty, greater lifetime value and higher profits. In retrospect, it looks like the bank got more than what it had bargained for...
20twenty`s initial acquisition targets were aggressive with 74,000 customers expected by the end of its first year of operation. However, these targets were exceeded with over 40,000 customers applying for a 20twenty banking account during the first six months of operations up to the end of December 2001. Sadly, during February 2002 20twenty was temporarily disabled by the curatorship of its first banking partner, Saambou.
One would think that under normal circumstances customers would take their cash and run for cover, but in this instance, the extraordinary happened. It is as if the bank`s fanatical customer obsession and the early loyalty shown towards 20twenty were paying off dividends in the most unexpected ways.
During the entire 18 months of curatorship, 94% of 20twenty`s customers maintained their accounts. With more than 50% of its customers remaining active, some even offered to pay their own money into the bank or to pay up to 100% more for the services, all in a bid to save 20twenty.
In a further surprising step customers set up their own online 20twenty support group through which customers demonstrated their emotional attachment to the bank, and their appreciation of the services and customer satisfaction. Support also poured onto the 20twenty website, and everywhere die-hard 20twenty customers could be seen sporting specially printed t-shirts that read, "20twenty - I love my bank". It seemed as if the infectious optimism of the management and entire staff contingent at 20twenty rubbed off on to its customers. In turn, it was their relentless enthusiasm for the brand that spurred 20twenty management to help secure the future of the bank as soon as possible. Communication throughout the curatorship period kept customers updated on discussions with possible new stakeholders, never giving any false reports on direction or security.
However, customers remained seemingly unphased by any set-backs or halts in talks with potential partners. The main concern from customers seemed to be that 20twenty ultimately would have to shut its virtual doors, and that they would be forced to go back to the "dread of traditional banking service", as one loyal customer so avidly put it in a support e-mail to 20twenty.
But now, at last, customers can look forward to a fresh start with its new partner, Standard Chartered Bank. Standard Chartered, a leading international bank in Asia, Africa and the Middle East, has been operating in Africa for over 140 years, and received the Euromoney "Best Bank in Africa" Award from 1998 to 2000. They have a particular strong presence in Ghana, Kenya and Zimbabwe.
With Standard Chartered Bank recently announcing its expansion plans in South Africa, 20twenty is geared to pilot SCB`s consumer banking activities here in the near future.
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