@Anonymous wrote:
You talk like you worked for CITI, lol.
I'm a company ceo and I can tell you that what they are doing is really bad for their business. Also, please dont ask me what company I worked for. I would like to remain anonymous.
Closing customers account will only be bad for them because they will completely CUT OFF the relationship between their customers. This really offset or put in reverse all their advertising efforts. That one customer can spread the BAD NEWS to hundreds of other potential customers. Look at what Circuit City have done. They tried to save money and ended up going bankrupt because the ceo DOES NOT have any clue.
Our company have been in business over 20 years and each year there is positive revenue. You want to know why? Because we treat our customers like gold. Having our customer service spending 2 hours talking to a customer that doesn't really do any business with us result in a lost. That is because we have to pay that customer service 2 hours worth of salary.
For the company to stand out, it doesn't matter whether or not you make money out of each customer. It's the overall image you gave them that counts.
If CITI continues to run their business this way, I can almost guarantee you none of their customers will be happy. NOT to mention their investors. Say bye bye, citi.
Never worked for citi... but I am a customer of theirs, begrudgingly. Once I have repaid them, I will no longer be a customer. This is a business decision on my end, because I don't like the way they do business and how they have treated me as a customer. That is how the business world works, and as a CEO I expect that you understand that.
You made a great point about paying customer service to stay on the phone with customers being a waste. If you are spending two hours on the phone with their customer service reps, why would they want you as a customer unless you made it worth their while by providing them with a profit? Hopefully, as a CEO, you can also relate that to maintaining not only a huge customer service base to service 200 MILLION accounts, but also the infrastructure necessary to provide security/fraud, underwriting, advertising, management, sales, and materials necessary to service those customer accounts.
If, at any time, a customer COSTS you more money than they provide, it would be stupid of you to continue servicing that account for a loss.
In your limited scope with relatively few customers (compared to a major bank), you may see an advantage to having an image that you care about your customers. That is how many Credit Unions are currently outgrowing larger national/multi-national banks. However, if you had a MILLION customers costing you money everyday to service, and they provide no income in return, I think you would be smart enough as an anonymous CEO to know that you need to drop those customers, or find a way of at least breaking even on them.
I don't expect the gas station to give me free gas just to make them look good.. do you?
As for how Citi runs its business... They seem to be doing okay for the last 198 years, with assets approaching $2,000,000,000,000. When you are CEO of a company with similar success and size, the world will take your "guarantees" about the future of their business more seriously.
to Citi. I personally like my Citi Diamond Rewards card, but if they charged an annual fee, I would probably close my account. I converted to the Diamond Rewards from my Student Platinum Select Dividend card and so far have not received an increase in APR as others have stated. (knock on wood)