A three-day conference on banking began at University College here on Tuesday with P. Jayaram Bhat, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Karnataka Bank, stating that consumers were increasingly looking for tailor-made and personalised banking products.
Mr. Bhat, who inaugurated the conference on ‘Indian banking: Managing transformation in the era of globalisation and Information Technology’, said that loyalty of customers to particular banks was diminishing.
Customers would drift from particular bank in case of a minor deficiency in service and look for a new one.
He said that the profile of banking consumers in the country is changing and it is a challenge for banks to meet their growing expectations. Mr. Bhat also said that managing technology, facing competition from other banks were other challenges and added thatauthorities should think out of the box to meet the expectations of consumers. Banks should also carefully look into security issues and the Reserve Bank of India has been frequently alerting banks to this effect.
K. Byrappa, Vice-Chancellor, Mangalore University, said that some bank managers still had the mindset of the 1960s and behaved arrogantly towards consumers and did not attend to their needs in branches.
He added that that there was still enough scope for rural banking in the country.
G. Gopalakrishna, Director, Centre for Advanced Financial Research and Learning, Mumbai, who delivered the key note address said that banks need to ensure that every family has at least one bank account and that is possible using digital technology, especially cell phone banking.
