Yeah, right!

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to realize that you can’t exceed your clients’ expectations by requiring them to pickup their bank statements from their respective branches on a monthly basis.

You don’t have to have an MBA degree to know that it is important to PROACTIVELY communicate changes in the terms and conditions of certain accounts with your clients.

I guess I have made my point when I talked to the Allied Bank Legazpi-Makati branch manager. Though I’m pretty sure she just made some empty promises to make me stop talking and leave her office.

I really hate dealing with local banks.

Thank you!

And here I am, stuck! LOL

ng stock market… okay okay, stock market na naman. hahaha. tapos malamang e sobrang up ulit ngayon. syet dude. nakakahinayang. pero oks na yun. panalo naman e. pero sayang pa din. hehe. gahaman ang mokong. takte.

Ayus ang stocks a. Up kanina ng almost 1% tapos malamang e up ulit bukas nang mataas. Hehehe. Wala lang. Sobrang up din kasi ang US stocks e. Cool.

Ang hindi lang cool e katawan ko. Sakit ng buong katawan ko e. Dahil sa kahahabol ng shuttlecock kahapon. Pero malamang next week e hindi na sasakit kasi sanay na ulit.

Coolness.

This is a very objective comment. Really.  If only I could get hold of an HSBC tele-banker, he/she will surely hear a lot of bad words from me. But all I can hear are tons of advertisements. For goodness’ sake, I’m calling from Kuala Lumpur and what I need is a tele-banker and not some stupid promos. Shit. It’s IDD and that means high cost.

Citibank is far better. And even Metrobank can accept calls promptly. But for the case of HSBC, it’s been always like this. Unreliable. It’s funny how they keep on playing the 24 hours, 7 days a week thing while their customers are waiting in vain to connect to a tele-banker. Stupid.

And you know what I did just to connect to one of their representatives? I chose the option “Report a lost card.” To my surprise, I still had to wait for at least two minutes. And their reason was that they were attending to lots of calls. I just said to the tele-banker that’s not true. When I tried to call in the morning I had to wait for several minutes but still not able to get hold of any of them. Same thing in the afternoon. And they will give me that reason when it’s almost midnight. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Arrrgh.

By the way, the reason why I called is to have the annual fee of my supplementary card reversed. But unfortunately, the cost of my calls is close to the amount of the annual fee. Crazy.

Five months ago, different financial institutions gave their predictions about the level of the Philippines Peso against the US dollar at the end of 2008. Most of their predictions were somewhere between 37 and 38. But now, these predictions seem impossible to happen. Blame it to the rising inflation. HSBC is now even expecting the peso to go as low 43 against the green buck. But who knows? Maybe it’s just another prediction that won’t happen.

If you are a consumer who looks for a fast, convenient and efficient way to do your day-to-day banking transactions, online banking might be the one for you.

Online Banking (also known as Internet Banking) allows customers to conduct financial transactions on a secure website operated by their retail or virtual bank, credit union or building society. Online banking solutions have many features and capabilities in common, but traditionally also have some that are application specific. The common features fall broadly into several categories: [1] Transactional (e.g., performing a financial transaction such as an account to account transfer, paying a bill, wire transfer… and applications… apply for a loan, new account, etc.), [2] Non-transactional (e.g., online statements, check links, cobrowsing, chat), [3] Financial Institution Administration and [4] ASP/Hosting Administration. (Online banking. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.)

In the Philippines, a remarkable bank which offers this channel is the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI). The range of services you can take advantage of is innumerable. From viewing real-time balances to transferring funds between your own deposit accounts and the accounts of your family members, friends and even the accounts of Mutual Fund Companies, Cooperative and many others. From paying your bills to reloading your cellphone. From applying for a credit card to applying for an auto or housing loan. Name it, they have it.

In Malaysia, I can say that Maybank is one the leading banks when it comes to Online Banking. Just like the BPI, Maybank has also a wide range of online services. For the Filipino Overseas Workers (OFWs), the most important one is the international Telegraphic Transfer or simply TT. Because the fee is just the same as that of the over-the-counter telegraphic transfer transaction, it is no doubt the most convenient way to remit money to the Philippines.

Truly, banking has been revolutionized by the advent of the Internet. It would not be surprising to see this area progress more. Let’s keep an eye on the next generation of online services that the banking sector will unfold in the next couple of years and enjoy the benefits it has to offer.