SkandiaBanken refines its contact routines

SkandiaBanken refines its phone contact routines, introduces one-week grace period During the past week a discussion has arisen in the Swedish media about the advice and information about financial products that SkandiaBanken provides to its customers by phone. Telephone banks have noted strong development in recent years, and today SkandiaBanken handles roughly a million personal phone contacts a year. SkandiaBanken's customers have chosen the bank because it combines high standards of service with competitive prices and terms, using phone- based service and the Internet as its chief platform. SkandiaBanken is now engaging its customers in an extensive dialogue in the aim of further refining its service, advice, and forms in which it handles customer contacts. This survey will be completed before year- end. In addition, SkandiaBanken has decided to implement the following measures: · Customers who decide to invest in mutual funds after talking with the bank will have the option of ordering the transaction to be executed directly on the next business day or to wait a week and think over their transaction before it is executed. This option will be presented and offered to customers in every phone contact. Customers who choose the one-week grace period will receive a written confirmation of their decision and what it entails. · Upon initial contact by the bank, customers will be given the opportunity to state whether they want to receive information by phone or not. This is to ensure that no customer receives information by phone against his or her wishes. · Employee competence is a key issue at SkandiaBanken. Therefore, the bank welcomes the opportunity to certify its employees' current level of competence through a licensing programme offered by SwedSec, which is owned by the Swedish Securities Dealers Association. The licences will certify all employees who inform customers about various savings alternatives by phone. Implementation of the one-week grace period requires certain changes in the bank's technical systems, which is why it will take effect on 12 November 2001. "The inflow of customers to SkandiaBanken shows that our customers in general want a more active bank which informs them about their various options," says Peter Carrick, President of SkandiaBanken. "At SkandiaBanken we owe our success to our customers' satisfaction with our products and way of working. We will continue to be responsive to their needs and will develop our routines and business according to our customers' wishes." For further information, please contact: Peter Carrick, President, SkandiaBanken, tel. +46-8-788 25 00 Göran Lenkel, Executive Vice President, SkandiaBanken, tel. +46-8-463 60 00 Birgitta Hammarström, press manager, Skandia, tel. +46-8-788 27 55, or +46-70-378 27 55 ------------------------------------------------------------ This information was brought to you by Waymaker http://www.waymaker.net The following files are available for download: http://www.waymaker.net/bitonline/2001/10/31/20011031BIT00720/bit0001.doc http://www.waymaker.net/bitonline/2001/10/31/20011031BIT00720/bit0001.pdf