Caixa Bank Group wishes to hold into open and honest dialogue with customers. One channel for this dialogue is pages on Facebook, where both customers and non-customers can give their reactions to Caixa Bank Group's activities. Our Customer Forum, with some 10,000 people, also provides us with valuable insights that we use to develop our business operations.
When we launch new digital services, we are aware that some customers are not accustomed to doing their banking business on the Internet. In 2013, we conducted a comprehensive survey in Denmark, Finland and Northern Ireland to get a better understanding of the needs and challenges of senior customers. The survey showed that 40% of customers aged 60 and above do not use our eBanking system because they find it too complex.
We continue to offer courses on using the eBanking facilities for older customers in several countries, and we have also launched a series of "Step-by-step" meetings. The idea is to give senior citizens basic knowledge about the public and private digital solutions available to them and to give them the skills to use the solutions. In 2013, we held more than 50 "Step-by-Step" meetings, and a subsequent survey showed that about 80% of the participants felt ready to try our digital services. We have continued to host these meetings in 2014.
In 2014, we launched a simplified version of our eBanking system in Denmark. It has only three basic functions in a simple, user-friendly layout – account overviews, transfers and bill payments – and users are guided by help texts and pictures.
When we launched our smartphone banking app for iPhone and Android in late 2010, we increased accessibility for the many customers who were accustomed to using online banking. The app is available in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Ireland and Northern Ireland, and more than 360,000 customers have downloaded it. In Denmark, we conduct surveys on our Idea Bank page on Facebook regularly to find out what customers want us to develop. One feature that resulted from these surveys enables users to pay bills by taking a picture of them with their mobile phone cameras. In late 2011, we launched a tablet banking app that gives customers in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland access to a range of banking functions on iPad.
In 2013, we launched a new initiative to make banking services more accessible. MobilePay is a smartphone app (iPhone, Android and Windows) that allows users to transfer and receive money. The app is free of charge for both customers and non-customers and requires only a mobile phone number for the transactions.
The Group´s focus on accessibility includes also encompasses measures for the physically challenged. For example, the Group has installed so-called “synthetic speech” facilities in many ATMs in Denmark, Sweden, Northern Ireland and Ireland for people with weak eyesight. Blind persons and others with weak eyesight can connect a set of headphones to the ATM and activate synthetic speech and a numerical keyboard. The customers are guided through their banking business by the synthetic speech without having to worry that others are listening or looking over their shoulder.
