Seeking advise on what should be logged. If customers calls, mails or file a complaint through an agency it is logged and tracked. The question came up about emails and text messages. Our lenders communicate with customers via email and on occasion a text message. On occasion a customer may respond with a negative response to a request or express dissatisfaction of a process or an individual. What is the general practice on this? Should we be reviewing emails received in the business to identify complaints and then record them?

You need to take a step back and answer this question for your organization first: what is your definition of a complaint?

Once you define what you consider a complaint to be, then you can determine what you log and when.

Agree with JJ. it has to be defined before you can come up with policies or procedures.

Additionally, generally e-mails and text messages are not secure. I would be concerned how those are used by the bank employees, especially on personal cell phones. (Bank computers are fairly secure, have anti-virus, malware protection, etc. Personal cell phones rarely have anti-virus, and in many cases, people take advantage of hot zones for communicating.)

the biggest issue I have with text messaging is if a customer lodges a complaint, and lets say the complaint is against the person they are text messaging, and that employee does not report it as a complaint, the bank is now at risk of not addressing complaint.

The definition as defined by CFPB as an expression of dissatisfaction. That's what I see in some emails I reviewed. They are annoyed because they are not getting the answers they want to hear. Is it compliant to eliminate email and text from scope? I need to be more clear or they we run the risk of capturing none. Any suggestions are welcome.

We have relationship management software and all complaints are logged there. We encourage staff to log everything that has to do with the bank's performance and policies no matter how it was received, even verbally. If a client tells a lender that our loan origination fee is ridiculously high, that is logged and we respond. If they complain that our ATM limits are too low, we log and respond. . . I use that example because last year we raised our ATM limit from $300 to $500 based primarily on a customer complaint. We had not changed them in years and had not really thought about it until someone complained. We did our research and learned that we were, in fact, well under the market for our area.

I read an article once that a very small % of dissatisfied clients will actually take the time to tell you. Every complaint you get represents multiple upset clients and needs to be addressed.

We draw the line at personality issues (I can't stand Susie teller) because some other customer likes that same teller so much they will wait in a longer line to have her wait on them. We also don't use that log for Reg E complaints, that obviously needs its own log. And we don't include clients who are upset about NSF fees unless it relates to a factor such as posting order - it isn't our problem if they can't manage their checkbook balance.

We train on this constantly. Our CEO loves to call it the "opportunities" log because every complaint is an opportunity to improve.