As online banking rise in Pakistan so too customer complaints

The rise in online banking has also lead to a surge in customer complaints against the banking system.

According to the report of the Banking Ombudsman, during the year 2020, the Banking Ombudsman received 25,500 complaints from bank customers, out of which 84 percent complaints were resolved and a total relief of Rs. 598 million was given to the customers.

It was learnt that the Banking Ombudsman received 15,600 complaints in 2019 but the number of complaints reached 25,500 in 2020 which shows an increase of 63 percent in one year. Digital banking has led to a significant increase in bank consumer complaints.

With the rapid rise in complaints during the first two months of the ongoing year, it is anticipated that number of complaints against banks could reach 40,000 this year.

Overseas Pakistanis were too approaching the Banking Ombudsman, 89pc of the complaining customers were men while the remaining 11pc were women. The Prime Minister's Portal also received 10,000 to 12,000 complaints from five major banks.

The banking ombudsman said that banks could not adopt inappropriate behavior for recovery, no call could be made at night for recovery, women could not be summoned, and fines could be imposed on violating banks.

The banking ombudsman said that the bank should focus on spreading awareness among the customers. Due to lack of public awareness, the number of complaints related to internet and ATM digital payments has increased by one thousand percent.

He said that bank customers are being called in the name of various institutions, fraudulent calls are also being made to the customers from numbers like the helpline of banks. Consumers affected by online fraud have been given huge amounts of money back from banks.