Treating Customers Fairly
The Treating Customers Fairly programme (TCF) aims to help restore customer confidence in the financial services industry and has at its core a set of principles derived from the customer perspective of what fairness means:
- Giving the customer what they have paid for
- Not taking advantage of the customer
- Offering the customer the best product possible
- Resolving mistakes as quickly as possible
- Showing flexibility, empathy and consideration towards customers
- Exhibiting clarity in all customer dealings.
Friends Provident began its TCF programme in 2004 and has been working hard since that time to embed the principles into its business processes and culture. The Financial Services Authority (FSA), which promotes the TCF programme, has set out six consumer outcomes and these guide Friends Provident's own programme:
- Outcome 1: Consumers can be confident that they are dealing with firms where the fair treatment of customers is central to the corporate culture
- Outcome 2: Products and services marketed and sold in the retail market are designed to meet the needs of identified consumer groups and are targeted accordingly
- Outcome 3: Consumers are provided with clear information and are kept appropriately informed before, during and after the point of sale
- Outcome 4: Where consumers receive advice, the advice is suitable and takes account of their circumstances
- Outcome 5: Consumers are provided with products that perform as firms have led them to expect, and the associated service is both of an acceptable standard and as they have been led to expect
- Outcome 6: consumers do not face unreasonable post-sale barriers imposed by firms to change product, switch provider, submit a claim or make a complaint.
Friends Provident’s TCF programme:
Customer Governance: A dedicated customer committee, established in 2007, continues to review and drive forward change regarding the treatment of customers and is responsible for ensuring that the TCF project makes a smooth transition to business as usual activity. A set of customer Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) has been introduced to measure success. Our director of customer operations chairs the committee, which is made up of senior representatives from across the business.
Through our work on TCF our customers have benefited from:
- A review of literature for individual products, and the development of an annual review process informed by customer feedback
- A review of customer letters to ensure they are clear and fair
- The adoption of a best-practice complaints handling process to ensure fairness
- The introduction of product suitability and responsibility statements for customers with supporting literature that is clear, fair and not misleading
- A review of our retirement process and literature to provide relevant, simple and unambiguous information to our members
- Extensive staff training and education to ensure that the fair treatment of customers remains central to their day-to-day role
A key focus for 2009 is to encourage greater feedback form customers; this will inform actions to improve products, customer communication and claims processes amongst other initiatives.
Performance data:
We include our scores from the Customer Impact Survey in a set of KPI’s to measure customer trust and confidence. These Customer Impact Survey scores can be downloaded from our reports page.
Related links
ABI Customer Impact Survey (external link, opens new window)
FSA Treating Customers Fairly (external link, opens new window)
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